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Speaking to school kids

On the 14th of October, I gave a talk to a group of school children in Bronkhorstspruit about the importance of weather observations in climate variability and change. I was told that my audience will be high school learners, but on the day very young learners from the nearby primary school turned up. There were about 200 learners in the hall, and most of them still in primary school. My challenge then was to tailor my presentation, which was initially intended for high school learners to now suite this rather young group. Luckily enough I had more pictures than text on my slides. The school - Erasmus High School , from which the majority of learners came, teaches mainly in Afrikaans, but the learners understand English very well.

The highlight of my presentation was how these young learners perfectly understood my message. This I was able to determine from the many questions they pose after the presentation. They wanted to find for example, when did climate change begin?; how can we stop it?; if things were to continue unattended, what is likely to happen in future?; if all ice were to melt in the Antarctica, what is likely to happen?. After this barrage of questions I concluded that the messages about climate change are clearly getting through these young people. Equally instructive was the challenge these young people were posing to atmospheric scientists, that they need to communicate in a language that can be easily understood. At the end of the day I was happy that my message went through.

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