Teaching Science Teachers about Masters of Disaster in Socioeconomically and Climatologically Vulnerable Counties of Georgia

本项目旨在通过使用一种创新但未得到充分利用的气象科学与安全课程——红十字会灾害硕士课程，加强乔治亚州K-8年级的地球科学教育。在2011年和2012年的夏天，主要研究人员正在为大约30名科学教师举办一系列为期一周的专业发展研讨会，这些教师来自佐治亚州三个选定的县组（Bibb， Brantley/Glynn和Calhoun），这些县组在社会经济和气候上容易受到严重和极端天气条件的影响。讲习班的重点是向教师讲授红十字会MoD天气科学和K-8学生安全课程。评估讲习班的有效性将决定对教师学习的影响，并最终决定学生在参加讲习班后传授MoD课程时学到了什么、学了多少以及他们带回家的知识。过去两年，在教师质量基金的支持下，佐治亚大学举办了规模较小的讲习班，结果表明，这些讲习班在提高科学教师的天气和气候素养方面大有希望。预期这项计划将提供有用的数据，说明国防部课程的成效，以增加学生对天气科学和安全的认识，并在学生及其家庭中推广天气安全文化。

This project seeks to strengthen K-8 geoscience education in the state of Georgia through the use of an innovative but underutilized weather science and safety curriculum, the Red Cross Masters of Disaster (MoD) curriculum. The principal investigators are conducting a series of week-long professional development workshops in the summer of 2011 and 2012 for approximately thirty (30) science teachers in each of three selected county groups (Bibb, Brantley/Glynn, and Calhoun) of Georgia that are socio-economically and climatologically vulnerable to severe and extreme weather conditions. The workshops focus on teaching teachers about the Red Cross MoD weather science and safety curriculum for K-8 students. Evaluation of the effectiveness of the workshops will determine impact on teacher learning, and eventually on what students learn, how much they learn, and what knowledge they take home with them when teachers deliver the MoD curriculum after attending the workshop. Smaller scale versions of these workshops, offered for the past two years at the University of Georgia with support by a Teacher Quality grant, have indicated that these workshops have much promise in increasing science teacher's weather and climate literacy. It is expected that this project will provide useful data on the effectiveness of the MoD curriculum to increase students' knowledge of weather science and safety and to promote a culture of weather safety in students and their families.