School mode
For teachers: the weather as a science laboratory
Forecasting the weather brings together physics, maths, geography and something very valuable: measuring whether we got it right. METEO / Atlas is free and ad-free, and its dashboard uses the same data as the professionals. Here are three ways to bring it into the classroom.
Worksheets
Five activities of 30 to 40 minutes using the real dashboard: aim, steps, questions and the answers folded away so they do not show when you project the page.
Weekly class challenge
Every day, pupils forecast tomorrow's maximum temperature at the school and whether it will rain. The next day it is compared with the nearest station and with the Atlas Forecast.
Observations from the school
The class reports what the weather is like in the playground with “What's the weather like where you are?”: it appears on everyone's map and is recorded in the class.
The worksheets
Each worksheet opens the dashboard exactly in the view you need. If you have joined your challenge class from this browser, the links open at the school's location.
- How a forecast is madeFrom observation to forecast. Upper primary (ages 10–12), secondary (ESO) · 30 min
- Why the models disagree: the 51 scenariosChaos and ensemble forecasting. Secondary (ESO), Bachillerato · 40 min
- Reading a pressure mapIsobars, highs, lows and wind. Final year of primary (ages 11–12), secondary (ESO), Bachillerato · 40 min
- What radar is and how it is extrapolatedWaves, echoes and forecasting the next hour. Secondary (ESO), Bachillerato · 30 min
- How the Atlas Forecast learns and how accurate it isAverage error and testing with unseen data. Year 10 of ESO (age 15–16), Bachillerato · 40 min
The weekly challenge, step by step
- You create the classWith your METEO / Atlas account, you give it a name (“6B”) and choose the school's location. You receive a six-letter code.
- The class forecastsEach pupil joins with the code and a made-up nickname, with no account or email, and says what maximum temperature they expect tomorrow and whether it will rain. They can change it until midnight.
- It is compared with what happenedThe next day, the challenge takes the maximum temperature and rainfall from the nearest official station (up to 25 km away) and what the Atlas Forecast and the median of the models said the day before.
- The weekly tablePoints for getting the maximum and the rain right, the average error for each nickname and the big question: can the class, all together, beat the computer?
On the interactive whiteboard
Large text
On the worksheets and in the challenge, the “Whiteboard mode” button enlarges the text and buttons so they can be read from the back of the classroom.
The simple view
For primary pupils, the dashboard's simple view sums up the day in short sentences. The Enthusiast view shows the maps and the models; the PRO view, everything else.
No spoilers
The answers on each worksheet are folded away. In the challenge, nobody sees anyone else's forecasts until the day closes.
How it fits the curriculum
The activities cover content from these subjects of the Spanish curriculum: Natural, Social and Cultural Environment in primary; Biology and Geology, Physics and Chemistry, Geography and History, and Mathematics in ESO; and Geology and Environmental Sciences, Physics and Mathematics in Bachillerato. The topics are the atmosphere and the weather, waves, statistics and probability, and the scientific method (hypothesis, measurement and verification).
Pupils' privacy
Pupils do not create an account or give any personal data. They only type a nickname within the class: ask them to make it up, without their first name and surname. We do not ask for email, age or location: the class's forecasts and observations refer to the school's location, rounded to ~1 km.
Each class, with its nicknames and forecasts, deletes itself at the end of the school year (31 July) or when you delete it. So that nobody can change another nickname's forecast, we keep a fingerprint of a random number from the browser, for two days only. Observations from the school are the public ones from “What's the weather like where you are?” and are deleted after 30 days.
As a teacher, you manage the class with your account: you can delete a nickname or the whole class whenever you like. The details are in the privacy policy.
Shall we try it in class?
If you use it, we would love to hear how it went and what you missed: write to us at info@fourmartech.es. Remember that these are guide forecasts: in any risk situation, the warnings from AEMET and Civil Protection are what count.