Forecasting Kitsap

Archive for March 1st, 2010

Weather and Destination ImagiNation

Monday, March 1st, 2010

I was asked to be a judge for the Destination ImagiNation tournament at Klahowya this weekend for the “Rising Stars” (K-2) and absolutely LOVED IT. I never did D.I. growing up, but really wish I had. For those unfamiliar with it, this would be a good definition from the organization itself:

“Destination ImagiNation‘s educational goals are to foster creative and critical thinking, to develop teamwork, collaboration and leadership skills, and to nurture research and inquiry skills involving both creative exploration and attention to detail”

As I mentioned previously, I had the privilege of watching the 6-8 year old age group present an 8 minute newscast/skit including certain subjects like weather, sports and current events. And can I just say—their presentations were adorable. They were all creative, energetic and so, so smart!

Several of the team members included weather reports and I found it so funny they highlighted rain on Monday, clouds on Tuesday, a tornado on Wednesday, snow on Thursday, thunder and lightning on Friday but plain sunshine for the weekend. I also felt bad for one student who said in the middle of the forecast: “And Thursday it will snow…at least I hope so, but I don’t think it will. I miss the snow! I haven’t seen snow forever!” And she was certainly right. We HAVEN’T seen snow in the lowlands since…last year! And that seems like forever.

Luckily, the little D.I. competitors aren’t going to be very accurate in their 7 day forecast predictions (and for that I took off 50 points. Just kidding!!) because the weather this week is shaping up to be quite pleasant, at least after tomorrow and Wednesday morning. Temperatures will remain in the 50s, but Thursday more generous amounts of sunshine will grace Kitsap County as highs jump into the upper 50s (maybe even a stray 60 degree reading?) which will last until Sunday when the weather will slowly deteriorate and rain/clouds enter the forecast again.

I certainly wish those D.I. teams were right about their crazy weather predictions this week. We’d actually have something exciting to talk about!