Weather Stations And Education

Wireless Weather Stations In Schools

The Easy Introduction To Math, Physics, Geography....

Kids And Weather Stations

We know that weather affects many parts of our lives, from choosing what clothes to wear right through to planning to reduce the effects of major weather events such as hurricanes, tornadoes and wildfires.

But in their own way, kids are just as interested in weather. It might just be uncertainty about the source of the noise and flashing light in a thunderstorm, it might be the fun of the season's first snowfall, or it could be TV News coverage of a natural disaster like a flood, tornado or hurricane.

Children also see the weatherpeople on TV, with their maps covered with strange symbols and wriggly lines.

It's natural that at times they want to know what's going on - is a tornado coming to get them, or will their home be flooded.

Looking back on my distant childhood, among my clear memories are stopping on the way back from a day at the beach to watch two waterspouts, and the days of rain followed by news reports of a major flood.

All this suggests that weather would be a good thing to include in a junior school curriculum, as some degree of interest is already there.

And what better way to introduce the subject of weather than through a weather station installed at the school.

Now I know school budgets are always tight and good reliable weather stations are not cheap. But there are companies and universities that can help out there - more on that later.

The implications are huge. Apart from potentially leading to an interest in the outdoors, study and observation of the weather provides an easy pathway to many other studies.

Such as mathematics - how about averages of rainfall and temperature, or conversions from Fahrenheit to Centigrade.

Or physics - how does a barometer measure air pressure, or a thermometer measure temperature?

Some Examples

These are some of the things included in the program at the Dr Marcella R Kelly School in Holyoke Massachusetts, where students not only have a wireless weather station on the roof of the school, but who have made or will make their own thermometers, rain gauges, barometers and weathervanes. (Jeanette DeForge, Springfield Republican, 04/23/06)

Not only that, but they have their own website and are in contact with other schools, both nearby and as far away as Ohio, Arizona and Puerto Rico. Imagine being able to get information on tornadoes in Ohio or hurricanes in Puerto Rico from school kids your own age!

And that brings me to some of the other paths an understanding of weather might lead to. Climatololgy and climate change are obvious ones, but geography and even botany, zoology and ecology can all be linked with weather.

And so can the physical earth sciences - weather may be strongly related to the start of a flood, but there is much more really interesting stuff that can be taught by following a flood from start to finish.

The Kelly School is part of a small, internet connected network of schools with weather stations. An even bigger network of schools can be found in Vancouver, Canada.

The May 2006 Issue of The Ring, a University of Victoria Community Newspaper, describes a network of 50 weather stations at public schools in the area.

This project was developed by Dr Andrew Weaver of the University of Victoria, with support from NEC and Davis Instruments, as well as from various educational boards.

In this case each school has its own Davis Vantage Pro2 Home Weather Station, which transmits weather to a receiver in the school, as well as a central receiver at the University.

This allows real time maps to be made of the city, which among other things show the variation of microclimate over a large area, stretching from the coast to well inland. You can view some of this information at www.victoriaweather.ca.

As in the case of the Kelly School, the network of weather stations allows both the teaching of basic meteorology and climatology, but, together with a resources guide, allows the integration of the weather stations into the science curriculum.

This is a great example of the integration of active research with imaginative teaching opportunities at early school levels. 50 weather stations collecting information from a small urban area provides numerous opportunities for research, with plenty of benefits to the kids at school. Schools and Commercial Interests

Strong ties are developing between schools and weather services, with win/win situations looking very possible, provided good sense and good will is maintained by both sides.

Weatherbug has recognized this, and exchanges its donations of weather stations and weather software to schools for increased coverage of local weather. Schools also benefit from early warnings of dangerous weather, while WeatherBug uses its increasing coverage to promote sales of related weather services to industry and news organizations. More on this in the future.

So overall the installation of weather stations in schools can only produce benefits to school children (provided of course that the information and relevance to the curriculum reaches the students). It's a mutually beneficial situation for both the schools and the organizations which sponsor weather stations, whether it's a short term commercial advantage, and aid to University research, or the potential of future sales resulting from an interest in weather persisting to the years after school.

For more on home weather stations, many of which would be suitable for use in schools, start at the main Home Weather Stations page and follow the links from there.

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