CARBONDALE (WSIL) -- COVID-19 is keeping our weather team out of schools at this time, but they do still have some recent adventures to share with you. The Storm Track 3 Team recently visited students at Thomas Elementary School in Carbondale.
Morgan Harris, a Third Grade Teacher, says, "We're actually starting science after spring break, and we'll be starting with weather, so today was like a perfect preview of what we're going to be learning the next few weeks."
Harris says our Weather Academy visit came just in time to kick off their next science unit. "We have done science, but it was towards the very beginning of the year, and we were learning about force and motion. So we did a lot of different projects with that force and motion, and then of course when it comes to weather, we'll be doing the tornado in a bottle, that type of thing, and some other things that go along with weather."
They will cover some of the same things that the Weather Academy focuses on teaching young students. "So we'll learn about the different types of clouds, and how the clouds produce different types of weather itself. We'll learn about the four seasons, and what to look for in the differences between all four of the seasons," elaborates Harris.
Harris teaches her class to be well rounded, which means in her class, emphasis is put on lessons you can't always learn from a book.
Georgia Lirely, Third Grader, says, "If they give the class a compliment, she writes it down and she puts it up there, and each time we get another step closer to a party."
Harris incentivizes good behavior in her classroom. Every time students get a compliment from outside of their classroom, they get one step closer to a reward.
"We actually have a compliment chain going on, which they have missing, they have missing chain links right now. They are working towards getting a slime party," explains Harris.
Lirely says a slime party is, "Where everybody makes slime and we just play with it all day."
Aside from science and weather, what are these students focusing on?
"Pay attention to the teacher, to follow directions when they're given to me," says Third Grader Emareyah Petties.
"I do brag on my kids a lot, and one thing they're known for in this school, the big thing is walking in the hallways quietly, which can sometimes be hard for third graders, but my kiddos, they get compliments all the time," adds Harris.
Next week our Storm Track 3 Team will take us to their final school visit in Tamms.
