Extended Abstract (440K)4.2
A virtual tornadic thunderstorm enabling students to construct knowledge about storm dyanmics through data collection and analysis
William A. Gallus Jr., Iowa State University, Ames, IA; and C. Cervato, C. Cruz-Neira, G. Faidley, and R. Heer
A visually-realistic tornadic supercell thunderstorm has been constructed in a fully-immersive virtual reality environment to allow students to better understand the complex small-scale dynamics present in such a storm through data probing. Less-immersive versions have been created that run on PCs, facilitating broader dissemination. An exercise involving the virtual storm was first used by a subset of students from a large introductory meteorology course in spring 2002. Surveys were used at that time to evaluate the impact of this activity as a constructivist learning tool. More recently, data probe capabilities were added to the virtual storm activity enabling students to take measurements of temperature at any point within the 3D volume of the virtual world, and see the data plotted via a graphical user interface. Similar surveys applied to the 2003 group of students suggest the addition of data probing improved the understanding of storm-scale features. Work is ongoing to add wind, humidity, and pressure data. A demonstration of the virtual storm will be a part of the presentation.
Session 4, University Educational Initiatives (Room 615/616)
Tuesday, 13 January 2004, 1:30 PM-5:15 PM, Room 615/616
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