OCR Text |
Show Weather forecasting is elementary, my dear by Nan Chalat If you are wondering whether the weather will be sunny or stormy next weekend, maybe you should check with the industrious young members of the Parley's Park Elementary school Science Club. Each day, 24 third and fourth graders take readings from the school's digital weather station and once a week they gather to share their scholarly predictions. They record minimum and maximum temperatures, wind speed and barometric pressure. In fact, Mark Eubank bases part of his forecast for the area on readings called into the KUTV station by Park City's elementary school students. "We start with a unit on weather so the students can learn how to observe and record data," explained m science club teacher Martha Crook. Later in the quarter, the club will study plants and take over responsibility for the school's aquarium. Membership in the science club is an honor for a select number of students who asked to be included and then were recommended by their teachers, said Crook. Fourth grader Christy Coelho wanted to be part of the science club "because I wanted to learn about the earth and the sky." Classmate Marnie LineDerry signed up for the club because it fit in with her plans to become a nurse. Third grader Matt Thomson said he was looking forward to studying plants later in the spring but he also found that studying the weather can be very interesting. "I like to come in the morning morn-ing and see how cold it was m the night before," he said while demonstrating how to find the minimum temperature. tem-perature. During the club's Wednesday Wed-nesday lunch meeting, the youngsters discuss the effects of the warm air current El Nino and they hypothesize about why the temperatures in the Snyderville Basin are often colder than the temperatures tem-peratures reported by the radio station on Main Street. They also plan experiments and learn how to construct simple weather measuring devices. "The students have to be very responsible because many of the experiments are continued at home," said Crook. So far, the students seem to be taking their scientific duties very seriously. "I'd say our predictions are as accurate as Channel 2's am." said Ma'!. |