Students go on air at channel 5 Weather Lab

Courtesy photo/Saint Olaf School

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SALT LAKE CITY – Weather is something that everyone talks about. The fourth-grade class at Saint Olaf School has not only been talking about the weather, but also learning many different facts about weather and meteorology from their teacher, Jeriel Turner. Their studies culminated with a recent visit to KSL’s Weather Lab, where they learned more about weather and weather forecasting from KSL Meteorologist Grant Weyman.

The students joined Weyman at the Discovery Gateway Children’s Museum, where a replica of the KSL TV weather set is used to produce weekly Weather Lab Segments. He explained that his job was to forecast the weather and answered many questions pertaining to television, forecasting and the weather. The students learned about the set, and the weather board which is a solid green color. The weather forecasters actually point to a blank screen and look at a TV monitor, which shows them the weather map so they know what they are pointing to.

Fourth-graders Kalyn Avery and Kierstin Soriano were individually featured on KSL TV News at Noon as they gave short weather forecasts for Salt Lake City and St. George. Then DJ Foti and Lauren Koob demonstrated an experiment called the Egg in the Bottle. They placed a boiled egg on the bottle opening of a gallon jug. The egg was obviously too large to fit through the opening. They heated the bottle, causing the air pressure inside to increase. After the egg was placed in the opening, the air cooled, exerting less pressure on the egg than the pressure exerted on the egg by the room air surrounding the egg. The greater pressure of the room air pushed the egg into the jug to demonstrate that air has high and low pressure.

After their experience at the Weather Lab, the students spent time exploring and playing with the exhibits in the museum. One favorite was the media area, where they could pretend to anchor a newscast or weather report. Another was a replica of a Life Flight Helicopter on the terrace of the museum, which drew many junior pilots, potential paramedics and make-believe patients recreating emergency situations all over the Salt Lake Valley. Many of the students also shopped in the make-believe grocery store, pretended to be firefighters and construction workers and joined together at the large size xylophone to play simple tunes.

The class received a wonderful compliment from one of the museum’s employees who stated that Saint Olaf School was the most well-behaved group of students they have had during the whole school year.