Final answer:
Average monthly temperatures are used to classify climates because they provide a stable long-term view of weather patterns, which is essential for understanding regional climates and supporting planning in areas such as agriculture and the study of global climate change.
Step-by-step explanation:
Average monthly temperatures are used to classify climates because climate can be defined as a long-term average weather pattern evident in a particular region. Compared to day-to-day weather, climate is what you expect over many years. Therefore, using average monthly temperatures allows scientists and geographers to categorize different climate types, such as those defined in the Köppen-Geiger classification system, which includes six basic types (A, B, C, D, E, and H). These average temperatures combined with precipitation levels give a more stable and long-term view of the conditions in a region, which is crucial for understanding how an environment functions and how it may support various forms of life and human activity.
Critical thinking on climate patterns indicates that average temperatures present a picture of general conditions rather than the fluctuations of short-term weather. This distinction is essential for various applications, ranging from agriculture, where planning is based on expected climate conditions, to the study of global climate change, which involves discerning the long-term trends in temperature and weather patterns rather than year-to-year variations.