Arctic Wednesdays 2026: Week 3 Pre-Trip Blog

 For whatever reason, I have distinct memories from science classes across the years.  I remember learning about body systems in 5th grade, my teacher bringing in a tray of beef fat for us to see and touch.  In 6th grade, we learned about sound waves, projecting music onto the wall using some sort of laser visualizer. I distinctly remember bringing in a cassette tape of the Muppets (I was an 80’s kid through and through!)  I remember getting a bloody nose by directly smelling something we were making with beakers and Bunsen burners.  I did, in fact, remember to use the waft method after that.   In 7th-grade science, I would go in early to dissect worms, grasshoppers, and whatever else my teacher had access to.  We would wander around the school yard identifying plants, and we made cell cakes.  It was this class that convinced me that someday I would teach science, middle school specifically!

Fast forward 20 years, and I am now teaching in a middle school science classroom of my own. I am driven by engaging in real-time, relevant science that both builds science and engineering skills while also promoting curiosity and wonder that will drive student inquiry into the future. 

I am in my 5th year of teaching 6th Grade Earth and Space Science, 7th Grade Life Science, and 8th Grade Physical Science. I’m finally finding myself familiar enough with the content that I’ve been able to branch out to develop more community partnerships and engage the students in the solutionary framework approach to science topics. The Institute for Humane Education defines this as a four-step process that people can use to become solutionaries. This includes identifying issues, investigating those issues, innovating and brainstorming possible solutions to those issues, and implementing actionable elements to their proposed solutions.  While I haven’t carried this process through in its entirety yet, I’m working toward developing a year-long unit on Weather and Climate with my 6th graders that will do just that.  

Having connected with a few other organizations with an interest in weather curriculum at a Connected Learning Ecosystem meeting last summer, hosted by the Squam Lake Science Center, I was able to secure a grant that would cover the costs of installing the weather station we had on campus, as well as pay for the Basecamp School Membership program through the Mount Washington Observatory (MWO).  We were already collaborating with Hubbard Brook, learning about their climate studies, and Plymouth State University to learn more about Meteorology and Weather Forecasting, but this would open up an opportunity to connect their understanding of climate and weather to one of the most iconic landmarks in New England - Mount Washington. 

We started this fall by considering the concept of ‘Hazards and Home’ - What do we consider home? What are hazards? How do hazards affect our home? We started making weekly observations of the clouds and weather, and added to our ‘Wonder Journals’ questions that we wanted to answer about what we were seeing and why it mattered.  Students use these journals during class, when exploring outside, on field trips, and when they want to capture ideas or questions that spark their curiosity.  We tracked clouds using the GLOBE Observer app, used NASA cloud identification charts to track clouds daily to look for patterns, and tried out MWO’s WeatherX unit on Local and Extreme Weather.  I modified one of the lessons and created meteorology teams of 3-4 students, where each started collecting weather data points for locations of interest for the students, with the hopes that we could track data across the year and compare our findings - Mount Washington being one of these data points.  We were lucky enough to have a MWO educator, Misha, join us in November for a lesson on Extreme Weather, which was a great introduction to instrumentation used to collect weather data, reasons for why Mount Washington records some of the weather patterns it does, including some of the ‘World’s Worst Weather’, and it got students curious about why that weather matters.  

This winter, I have been fortunate enough to join the Arctic Wednesday program, where on Wednesday, February 4th, I’ll travel to the summit of Mount Washington to gather data, meet with some of the scientists collecting data on the mountain, and connect with my students back on campus.  I have hiked up to Mount Washington from both the southern presidential range, as well as from the northern presidentials, but have yet to be on the peak in the winter.  I am super excited to experience winter on the mountain, and through the lens of their team of scientists!   This visit will be really helpful as I wrap my head around my spring scope and sequence.  My 6th graders will have one more virtual lesson with observatory scientists, and will then get to take a trip to the summit themselves at the end of May or in early June.  Our goal is to develop research questions relating to weather or climate and the mountain and present our findings at the MWO Museum.  

Tomorrow I will be laying out all of my gear, confirming details for video conferencing with my students/school, and creating record sheets for collecting data on questions my students are curious about - whether the wind can push me back when I jump, the temperature from the bottom of the mountain to the top, and how my heart rate changes with elevation (if at all). With the push of arctic air into New England and beyond the last few weeks, I’ve wondered if we would be able to run this trip, but as of my writing this blog post, the forecast for Wednesday is looking doable with temps around 0 degrees Farenheight, winds between 20 and 45 mph, and wind chills well below 0.  Nothing some well-layered winter gear can’t handle! I’m hoping to learn more about weather data, instrumentation, the mountain, the science, and the people behind this incredible organization. Signing off for now.  

Jess Boynton
Sant Bani School
Sanbornton, NH