Most models now agree...Ike track further south

HURRICANES AND WEATHER
Well you can probably guess why I am late...trying to automate the posting of this blog. Appreciate your cooperation and patience.Feeling better about Ike but still see a few models which show an influence of the incoming trough and turn it northward. No current model runs show a direct hit for the upper Texas Coast.

Highest percentage show a King Ranch landfall late Friday, early Saturday.Please watch it though because a turn to the north could send it rapidly our way at the last minute. Let's not let our guard down.

If it moves in to our south, we should get some rain. My fall garden will appreciate that.

It should be a major hurricane at landfall...so there will be potential for damage. The King Ranch is sparsely populated although Kingsville is just to the north.

SPANISH

Since we have some rain in the forecast, thought I would do lluvia, the Spanish word for rain. This is pronounced you-vee-ah. Yep, we sure could use some you-vee-ah.

Effects of spanish immersion on children's native english vocabulary were studied. Matched on grade, sex, and verbal scores on a 4th-grade Cognitive Abilities Test (CAT), 30 th- and 6th-grade immersion students and 30 english monolinguals did 60 consecutive Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT) items...Findings support the idea that Spanish immersion has English-language benefits and that positive transfer (cross linguistic influence) occurs from Spanish as a foreign language to native English receptive vocabulary.

This came from Cunningham, T.H., & Graham, C.R. (2000). Increasing native english vocabulary recognition through Spanish immersion: cognate transfer from foreign to first language. Journal of Education Psychology, 92(1), 378-49. from PsycINFO database.Looking for something educational and entertaining. Order my Dr. Toy Top 10 Education Product award winning DVD, Let's Learn Spanish with Frank & Paco from from http://www.frankandpaco.com, Ventura's Educational Supply, Dolo Publications, Carlex Inc., The Curious Mind Store, amazon.com, bestbuy.com, and barnesandnoble.com.

AND MORE

I am on the board of The John C. Freeman Weather Museum, the nation's first and only weather museum and it's right here in Houston, 5104 Caroline St.--the heart of the museum district. If you haven't checked it out, please do so!!! Your kids will love it!!! The museum has done so much for our community already...encouraging youngsters to pursue careers in math and science. They offer fantastic weather camps. And we have a fun Groundhog Day gala coming up on Feb. 2, 2009. You can find out more by going to http://wxresearch.org/.

That's it for now. Don't worry...I'm watching Ike for you! Have a great day and be safe!

Cecilia Sinclair
Wonder Weather Woman