Using the Web to support teaching introductory classes in meteorology

For the past 8 years, better methods for teaching an introductory meteorology class for non-majors have been explored. Experience has shown that the most important aspect of an introductory course like this is to go beyond just teaching some basic concepts of the weather, but enabling non-science majors to gain an understanding of how scientists explore their environment as they "do science." This paper initially presents the evolution of the teaching techniques and discusses the lessons learned, and then discusses the need to expand the use of Web-based tools to allow students to explore their environment through on-line collaborations using real-time weather maps and data to predict the weather implemented in the Fall 2000. Evaluation of this collaboration will be presented.