Search Results
You are looking at 1 - 4 of 4 items for
- Author or Editor: Loran Carleton Parker x
- Refine by Access: All Content x
Abstract
A summer course has been developed at Purdue University that leverages students’ intrinsic desire to observe tornadoes as a motivator for learning severe storms forecasting. Relative to previous “storm chasing” courses described in the literature, the Students of Purdue Observing Tornadic Thunderstorms for Research (SPOTTR) course is enhanced by active learning exercises, career exploration activities, and the inclusion of research-grade meteorological instrumentation in order to provide an authentic in-field experiential learning scenario. After teaching severe weather forecasting skills and deployment techniques for several meteorological instruments (such as a mobile radar, radiosondes, and disdrometers), the instructors then guide the students on a 1-week field trip to the Great Plains, where the group executes a miniature field campaign to collect high-quality meteorological observations in and near severe storms. On days with no targetable severe weather, the participants visit sites deemed beneficial to the students’ professional development. The final week of the course is spent performing retrospective case studies based on the observations collected, and distilling lessons learned. Surveys given to SPOTTR students show that students’ understanding of severe storms forecasting, technical skills, and career aspirations all improved as a result of having participated in the SPOTTR course, affirming the efficacy of the course design.
Abstract
A summer course has been developed at Purdue University that leverages students’ intrinsic desire to observe tornadoes as a motivator for learning severe storms forecasting. Relative to previous “storm chasing” courses described in the literature, the Students of Purdue Observing Tornadic Thunderstorms for Research (SPOTTR) course is enhanced by active learning exercises, career exploration activities, and the inclusion of research-grade meteorological instrumentation in order to provide an authentic in-field experiential learning scenario. After teaching severe weather forecasting skills and deployment techniques for several meteorological instruments (such as a mobile radar, radiosondes, and disdrometers), the instructors then guide the students on a 1-week field trip to the Great Plains, where the group executes a miniature field campaign to collect high-quality meteorological observations in and near severe storms. On days with no targetable severe weather, the participants visit sites deemed beneficial to the students’ professional development. The final week of the course is spent performing retrospective case studies based on the observations collected, and distilling lessons learned. Surveys given to SPOTTR students show that students’ understanding of severe storms forecasting, technical skills, and career aspirations all improved as a result of having participated in the SPOTTR course, affirming the efficacy of the course design.
Learning about the nature of science involves learning about science, its goals, methods, products, and practitioners. As university students progress through their studies, what are they learning about science? Several studies have attempted to answer this question, but none have examined the ideas of atmospheric science students. We discuss the results of a single study that explores introductory undergraduate atmospheric science students' ideas about the nature of science, and examines relationships between these ideas and students' previous university science coursework. We focus on the ideas about the definition of science, about scientific knowledge, about the scientific process, and about the scientific enterprise held by a group of undergraduate atmospheric science students. Unlike previous university students studied, the majority of these students viewed science as an enterprise that requires creativity and imagination. They also believed science to be a discipline that “proves” its assertions by subjecting them to a series of confirming “tests” through which scientific knowledge travels upward in a hierarchy of proof from the status of “theory” to “law.” This understanding about the nature of science is divergent from the nature of science as described by many philosophers, scientists, and science educators. We discuss the possible implications of these results for scientists and science educators, and urge them to open dialogs about the nature of science with their own students, as well as the general public.
Learning about the nature of science involves learning about science, its goals, methods, products, and practitioners. As university students progress through their studies, what are they learning about science? Several studies have attempted to answer this question, but none have examined the ideas of atmospheric science students. We discuss the results of a single study that explores introductory undergraduate atmospheric science students' ideas about the nature of science, and examines relationships between these ideas and students' previous university science coursework. We focus on the ideas about the definition of science, about scientific knowledge, about the scientific process, and about the scientific enterprise held by a group of undergraduate atmospheric science students. Unlike previous university students studied, the majority of these students viewed science as an enterprise that requires creativity and imagination. They also believed science to be a discipline that “proves” its assertions by subjecting them to a series of confirming “tests” through which scientific knowledge travels upward in a hierarchy of proof from the status of “theory” to “law.” This understanding about the nature of science is divergent from the nature of science as described by many philosophers, scientists, and science educators. We discuss the possible implications of these results for scientists and science educators, and urge them to open dialogs about the nature of science with their own students, as well as the general public.
