By NewsLine Staff
mail@floridanewsline.com
A recently installed weather system will now provide live, hyper-local data that will be used to energize lessons in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) at Jacksonville Country Day School. The WeatherSTEM combines data from scientific instruments and sensors with STEM curriculum. The system also provides current in-depth weather information for the area around the Southside school through a dedicated website, which residents may access.
The WeatherSTEM was a gift to Jacksonville Country Day School from the Hillyard family, whose two sons attend the school.
“When I saw WeatherSTEM’s capabilities, I knew that Jacksonville Country Day School, with its long-standing commitment to math and science, would be a perfect fit for this emerging technology,” parent and donor Michael Hillyard said.
WeatherSTEM integrates many different weather sensors. The data gathered and stored by the sensors are displayed dynamically on a website that showcases the current weather, weather forecasts, data mining tools, lessons/activities, weather notifications, videos and more. The system also includes library of lessons and activities for integration of the data and sensors into the school’s STEM-based curriculum.
The school’s science/tech integration specialist, Shannon Johnson, said, “All of our students, from the youngest to the oldest, will be able to use our WeatherSTEM station to learn about meteorology.”
From watching the anemometer spin, to giving daily weather reports based on information on the WeatherSTEM website, to understanding cause and effect relationships between various weather phenomenon, to making connections between images on the cloud camera and data displayed on graphs, Jacksonville Country Day School students will begin to ask thought provoking questions.
Residents living on the Southside are invited to use this link for up-to-the-second detailed weather information: http://duval.weatherstem.com/user_generated/modules/station/duval/jcds/handout.pdf
Photo courtesy Ian Nyquist
Ucompass CEO Edward Mansouri, who developed WeatherSTEM, with Jacksonville Country Day School science specialist Shannon Johnson
