LEARN ABOUT CREATURES

NASA has a citizen science project about recording sky cloud cover. The point of this is "Measurements from these experiments test the accuracy of satellite instruments. Cloud observations made by people, such as S'COOL participants, are also an important part of this ground truth exercise."

NASA Ceres S'cool project

The project involves knowing when a satellite is going to pass overhead in the sky, and then recording information about the clouds.

The reason why I am listing this project on this site is because they say that this has important consequences in being able to study the changing climate.

They have some information about learning about clouds. They note that 'deciding which kind of cloud is which is an art' and so school groups will vote on the kind of cloud. The reason for the observations is that the satellite can't distinguish the depth of the cloud, so the observations are more about low, medium and high clouds. (I think that's right.)

Online Tutorial

The trade is a pretty standard citizen science trade - scientists get work done, people get to look at the sky and learn some stories about clouds (but nothing exhaustive) and in return they help calibrate the satellites. Teachers and students in schools get to compare data between the satellite and their own observations. So there are probably a lot of tangible connections to climate change, math, computer science, engineering, water, physics and meteorology.

It seems worth it to really try to find out what we get back from the data. What are all the research projects that are conducted with these satellites?

It's just not as cool as what I, as a citizen, WANT to know about our clouds. Certainly, a gifted teacher would be able to bring this to life - which would make for another really good activity, training people in how to be cloud guides. It could be so much cooler!

But, I will say this. When we have severe thunderstorms here in Minnesota, which in the summer is almost every other day, the satellites that tell the weather better be accurate because I haven't processed my feelings about tornadoes and they frighten me. The satellites do provide some solace, but then again, I just watch the satellite data to see when MY part of the storm is over, and then I have feelings of being relieved that the storm is now someone else's problem. This is probably not a very healthy attitude!

Also, it would be good to learn about satellites and how we have actually physically taken objects from the earth and put them into the sky in order to see and analyze our planet.