Snowpack Study in Technical Communication

In the section I teach of Technical Writing at Plymouth State College in New Hampshire, students learn to handle the content, form, and style of scientific reports by writing about a snowpack. In this context, snowpack study requires students to learn and apply only elementary concepts of snow physics, but it establishes common experiences inscience for students with non-scientific backgrounds. During an initial field trip, students examine the layers in a snowpack and observe the various characteristics of snow. For two weeks after the first field observations, students study local weather history and learn basic concepts of snow science, snow stratigraphy, and snow metamorphism. Based on their new understanding of snow, they hypothesize what changes have probably occurred in the snowpack, and they learn to identify types of snow particles in the field. During a second field trip, students re-examine the snowpack, compare their hypotheses with actual conditions they observe, and account for persistence and change in the snowpack during the two week interval. At each stage in the snowpack study unit, students keep a log of their observations and write up their findings in a series of technical reports. They also keep a journal of their experiences and write essays in which they examine their personal experience in snowpack study and assess the snowpack study unit. Finally, they compile their reports, then edit and polish them. THE RATIONALE FOR SNOWPACK STUDY Consider winter as a classroom, limited not by walls, but only the imaginations of those who venture forth. Halfpenny and Ozanne Winter, an Ecological Handbook Informal surveys among my students at Plymouth State College in New Hampshire suggest that many people are poorly informed about snow. They ignore it, deplore it, or see it only as an adjunct to a sport or play. A student of mine told me he had never thought much about snow: “I knew it was white and fluffy and sometimes it was compactible (good for snowball fights, and snowmen).” His only thoughts about snow were “how beautiful it was, how great it was to ski and snowmobile on, how much I enjoyed playing in the snow, and how much of a pain it was to shovel the driveway.” Beauty, play, sport, nuisance-that summarizes the experience ofmost people with snow. Snow ?as lain all around them, but people have never examined Its structure or the agents that change it. This indifference to snow permeates our educational system as well. My survey of dozens of school science texts and science projects described in print and on the Internet show that teaching about snow in the schools has been neglected. Typical school science projects have students merely draw and cut out snowflakes or determine the water content of snowflakes by melting a can of snow. Many school science textbooks fail to mention snow altogether. The motto seems to be, “When the crickets die, bring the science indoors.” I want to help change that view. Capitalizing on this neglect of snow science, I have used snowpack study four times in my course in Technical Writing (EN309) at Plymouth State College. This is a junior-level course designed to introduce students from various academic departments to technical and scientific writing. Although I limit the study to the physical characteristics of snow on flat ground, snowpack study in this course provides students ample opportunity for extensive observation, interpretation, and reportirlg. THE AIMS OF SNOWPACK STUDY At the beginning of the course, I state the aims of the snowpack study unit as follows: Aim 1. Learn and use scientific procedures. Students conduct scientific investigation through a series offield tests. Aim 2. Learn and apply scientific knowledge. Students quickly learn the fundamentals of a new science. Aim 3. Learn to interpret data. Students integrate their knowledge and experience. Aim 4. Create and participate in a scientific community. Students work individually and collaboratively. Aim 5 Communicate about science to the wider scientific community. Students create written texts and visuals in various modes for varied audiences. Aim 6. Develop personal qualities . Students develop skills, attitudes, values, and goals appropriate for a scieritist. THE BENEFITS OF SNOWPACK STUDY Snowpack study makes students more aware of their environment. Because our students live on the third of the earth’s surface where snow falls, they can study a snowpack on their own college lawn with a minimum of equipment; they can study it individually or in a group. And because snowpack study has not been widely used in our schools, it is a fresh topic. Students discover things they had little suspected. Although snowpack study is presented in this course as pure science and as a subject for writing, it also prepares students to understand applications of snow science in glaciology, avalanche studies, ecology, or hydrology, as well as to participate more safely in winter sports. Whether viewed as pure science or applied science, snowpack study encourages wider understanding of one of nature’s most interesting materials. One value of snowpack study in a technical writing course is that it provides a common experience in science among students with limited technical backgrounds. No member of the class is likely to know anything about the subject, so everyone starts off even. Snowpack study is suitable for these students because meaningful study of snow on the ground requires little prior scientific knowledge and hardly any mathematics.