‘Weather in a tank'

http://paoc.mit.edu/labguide

Lodovica Illari and John Marshall, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Amit Tandon, University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth

Richard Clark, Millersville University

Sukyoung Lee, Pennsylvania State University

Tom Haine, Johns Hopkins University

Galen McKinley and Michael Morgan, University of Wisconsin at Madison

and

Kathleen Mackin, Stratham, NH

We report on an NSF-funded project in which curricula materials that combine atmospheric data and rotating laboratory fluid experiments are being developed in the teaching of meteorology, oceanography and climate at undergraduate level.

In phase I of the project, methodologies were explored in support of laboratory-based teaching of rotating fluid dynamics to sophomores, juniors and seniors at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

We discuss Phase 2 in which we are:

• implementing material developed in Phase 1 at the following 5 universities: University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, The Johns Hopkins University, Millersville University, Pennsylvania State University, and the University of Wisconsin, Madison;

• exchanging and exploring ideas and methodologies in laboratory-based teaching with professors and students at those universities, including appropriate training; and

• developing evaluation materials to determine whether our approach is successful pedagogy and, if so, whether it could be broadly sustained and so benefit a wide community.

The project explores how basic principles of rotating fluid dynamics, that play a central role in determining the climate of the planet, are best conveyed to students, teaching them how to move between phenomena in the real world, laboratory abstractions, theory and models.

We will present our experiences after one year of implementation at the above colleges and discuss whether the laboratory materials and associated curricula being developed could have a wide impact in the teaching of science at many levels in our universities and schools, not just in meteorology, oceanography and climate.