Why can't the wind blow the haze away?
A plain-English answer for grown-ups of kids aged 6–9, taken from the Yufena lesson that explores this question.
This lesson is free to try. No card, no sign-up.
The answer, for parents
Short answer: A warm-air lid can trap smoke low over the city, so on calm days the haze stays.
It is the dry season in Sumatra and Kalimantan. Farms and peatland start to burn. Thick smoke rises high into the sky. Then the monsoon wind blows. It pushes the smoke across the sea. The haze reaches Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei.
Sometimes warm air sits on top of cooler air. It is like a lid on a pot! The smoke is trapped low over the city. Scientists call this an inversion. On calm days, there is almost no wind. The fires keep burning. So new smoke keeps coming!
In the lesson, your child puts this cause-and-effect chain in order: Dry season → Fires burn → Smoke rises → Wind blows it to KL & Singapore → Warm-air lid traps it → We breathe hazy air.
What if it rains a lot? Rain washes smoke out of the air. The sky gets clearer.
Where else does air get trapped? Some big cities get smog in winter. Cold air gets stuck near the ground.
Try it with your child
Time for a mini experiment! A grown-up pours hot tea. Then they hold a cold plate above the cup. Look! The steam cannot go through the plate. It gathers underneath, like smoke under the lid.
Safety: Safety first: grown-ups handle the hot tea.
Explore it together in the free lesson
Guess, find clues, build the chain and try the experiment. Read it together.