{"id":77,"date":"2023-06-26T16:29:37","date_gmt":"2023-06-26T21:29:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/somoutreach.wordpress.com\/?page_id=77"},"modified":"2026-04-23T18:53:35","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T18:53:35","slug":"previous-events","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/somoutreach.som.ou.edu\/index.php\/previous-events\/","title":{"rendered":"Previous Events"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Santa Fe Elementary School Outreach Events<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

April 7, 2026 and April 21, 2026<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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SoMO visited Santa Fe South Hills Elementary School. We provided demonstrations, including hail impact pads and the cloud in a jar and runoff demonstrations to two separate groups of kids: 2nd and 3rd graders and 4th and 5th graders. The students were very interactive and curious about hail and the water cycle.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Reagan Elementary Reading Night<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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April 2, 2026<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

SoMO had a great time teaching the Reagan Elementary community weather and science at their reading night! Students and their parents traveled around the school, visiting different organizations, and marking off BINGO their cards at each stop. We had a table set up with three stations: water run off, cloud in a bottle, and build your own anemometer. The event ran for a hour and a half and we were busy the whole time with around 50-60 people who stopped by our table. Students enjoyed our demonstrations and left with smiles on their faces!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Boys Ranch Visit<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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March 25, 2026<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

SoMO made a visit to the Boys Ranch Town in Edmond, OK on March 26, 2026. We discussed types of extreme weather in Oklahoma and how to stay safe in different weather situations. With the high school age students we discussed careers in meteorology, including several careers that don’t require a meteorology degree but are directly or indirectly impacted by weather. With the elementary and middle school students we discussed hail formation and tested hail impact pads with objects (baseballs, ping pong balls, rocks) that replicate various possible hail sizes.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Oklahoma City Blue Severe Weather Night<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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March 24, 2026<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

SoMO attended the Oklahoma City Blue Severe Weather Night basketball game. We provided demonstrations including cloud in a bottle, tornado in a bottle and the hail impact pads. SoMO members also attended the basketball game to cheer on the OKC Blue! <\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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SPARK Outreach Event<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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March 2, 2026<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

SoMO attended the Urban Mission SPARK program on early March to teach elementary school kids about the weather. We had demonstrations about the water cycle, hail and seasons. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Reagan Math and Science Night <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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November 6, 2025 <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

SoMO attended Reagan Elementary\u2019s Math and Science night providing demonstrations for elementary school students and their families. Kids were mesmerized by the hail dryer experiment, seeing how updrafts help create and sustain hail while also learning what causes hail to fall. SCAN\u2019s weather friend Swirl Girl helped out with tornado in a bottle experiments.  Students got to learn how tornadoes form while watching vortexes get created in the bottles.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Women In STEAM<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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November 5, 2025 <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

SoMO attended the Women in STEAM Conference at the Science Museum Oklahoma, providing demonstrations for middle and high school students interested in STEAM subjects. Visitors saw cans being crushed by phase changes combined with air pressure, and various atmospheric soundings showing characteristics of different weather patterns.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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National Weather Festival<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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November 1, 2025<\/em>
About 300 people visited SoMO\u2019s demonstrations at the National Weather Festival! This was SoMO\u2019s fourth time at the NWF. We hosted live rotating tank, cloud in a bottle, and tornado in a bottle demonstrations. Visitors could also create their own wind vane that they could take home with them. Weather safety bingo was hosted that provided information on what items are recommended to be prepared for severe weather.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Community Christian School Visit<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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September 20, 2025<\/em>
SoMO welcomed an AP English class from Community Christian School to the National Weather Center. The class was reading Isaac\u2019s Storm <\/em>and wanted to learn more about the science behind hurricanes. SoMO performed a demonstration and lecture for the class, and helped the class arrange tours of the NWC and ARRC. In the demonstration, we showed the importance of the Coriolis effect using a rotating tank. The lecture then built on this demonstration by exploring the other factors necessary for hurricane formation, explaining the structure of hurricanes, and discussing the impacts hurricanes can have on both coastal and inland communities. We concluded the lecture with a section on hurricane forecasting, including the challenges of forecasting in a warming climate and, despite these challenges, showing how much hurricane forecasts have improved over the last 20 years.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Southwest OKC Library Event<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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August 5, 2025<\/em>
SoMO visited the Southwest OKC Public Library, holding tables to engage with children of all ages and their parents. Many demonstrations were held, including on severe weather<\/strong>, severe weather safety<\/strong>, learning about pressure with a can crushing<\/strong> experiment, and the cloud-in-a-bottle<\/strong> experiment to conceptualize the water cycle. Attendees particularly enjoyed building their own cup anemometers and testing them out in the wind!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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OU Horizons Engineering Week<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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July 14 – 18th, 2025<\/em>
SoMO gave a weeklong series of lectures and demonstrations to middle schoolers at a summer camp. Topics included the vertical structure of the atmosphere, pressure, temperature, fronts, precipitation, and severe weather. Demonstrations included can crushing and a rotating tank demonstration. Students also got to learn about the radar trucks at OU. Throughout the week, students contoured different atmospheric variables such as temperature and pressure on weather maps to make predictions on a severe weather case.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Truman Primary School Visit<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n
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May 19, 2025<\/em>
SoMO visited with the first graders at Truman Primary School in Norman, Oklahoma. Students were guided through four interactive stations that taught Severe Weather<\/strong>, Severe Weather Safety<\/strong>, Water Cycle<\/strong>, and Earth, Sun and Seasons<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Reagan Elementary School Visit<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n
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April 24, 2025
<\/em>SoMO visited Reagan Elementary School to help with their reading night. This even was water cycle-themed, with a cloud in a bottle demonstration and water cycle coloring sheets.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Wilson Elementary School Visit<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n

April 4, 2025<\/em>
SoMO visited the First Graders at Wilson Elementary School in Norman, Oklahoma. Students were guided through four stations to explore meteorology topics with hands-on activities. The four stations covered Severe Weather<\/strong>, Severe Weather Safety<\/strong>, Water Cycle<\/strong>, and Earth, Sun and Seasons<\/strong>. Activities at these stations included dropping hailstones to determine the magnitude of their impacts and spinning a tornado in a bottle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

National Weather Festival<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n
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October 26, 2024<\/em>
SoMO participated in the National Weather Festival at the National Weather Center in Norman, OK for the third year in a row. We had over 300 visitors. Demonstrations included can crushing<\/strong> using atmospheric pressure and fluid flow<\/strong> in a rotating tank. Visitors could also spin a tornado in a bottle<\/strong> and make a rainbow<\/strong> out of contact paper and tissue paper.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Women in STEAM Visit <\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n
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October 8, 2024<\/em>
SoMO participated in the women in STEAM event at the Science Museum of Oklahoma in Oklahoma City. This event allows middle and high school students to learn about careers in science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics. Students could learn about careers in meteorology<\/strong> and make hailstones out of Play-Doh<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Earth Educators Rendezvous<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n

July 15-19, 2024<\/em>
SoMO presented a poster about our organization and learned about educational strategies at other institutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Truman Primary School Visit <\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n

May 16, 2024<\/em>
SoMO visited with the First Graders at Truman Primary School in Norman, Oklahoma. The visit was tailored similarly to the February 2024 visit at Wilson Elementary School, where students were guided through four stations focused on Severe Weather<\/strong>, Severe Weather Safety<\/strong>, Weather Measurements<\/strong>, and Earth, Sun and Seasons<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Second Wilson Elementary School Visit <\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n

April 5, 2024<\/em>
SoMO was invited to a return visit with the First Graders at Wilson Elementary School in Norman, Oklahoma. Students were guided through four activities, two related to Moon phases<\/strong> and two related to eclipses<\/strong>. For eclipses, students were able to create pinhole viewers that they could use to view the eclipse the following week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First Wilson Elementary School Visit <\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n

February 23, 202<\/em>4
SoMO was invited to visit with the First Graders at Wilson Elementary School in Norman, Oklahoma. Students were guided through four stations to explore meteorology topics with hands-on activities. The four stations covered Severe Weather<\/strong>, Severe Weather Safety<\/strong>, Weather measurements<\/strong>, and Earth, Sun and Seasons<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I know there are lots of future meteorologists thanks to your visit!<\/em>“<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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National Weather Festival<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n
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October 29, 2023
<\/em>SoMO participated at the National Weather Festival where we demonstrated fun experiments and hands-on activities for all ages!
We handed out weather safety<\/strong> coloring worksheets, encouraged kids to make their own DIY cup anemometer<\/strong> that measures wind speed, demonstrated how hail forms<\/strong> and grows<\/strong>, walked kids through a fun coding activity<\/strong>, showcased a tornado in a bottle, and had a dry ice tornado demonstration.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Women in Science Conference<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n
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October 4, 2023
<\/em>In collaboration with OU SCAN, SoMO participated in the NSF EPSCoR sponsored Women in Science Conference. This conference was for middle and high school girls and their teachers.
Our team developed a hands-on activity that illustrated how weather balloon observations<\/strong> look and how meteorologists use them to determine different types of weather.
It also encouraged girls<\/strong> that that coding is not intimidating and can actually be fun!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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