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mokenamessenger.com news
the Mokena Messenger | April 20, 2017 | 5
Solar panels show students ‘real world’ science
Kirsten Onsgard, Editor
Summit Hill Junior High
seventh-grader Amanda Butryn
dipped a thermometer
into three beakers: one ice
cold, one warm, one hot. She
and her classmates watched
the tiny UV beads inside,
illuminated by an overhead
projector.
Like the real solar panels
that now help power their
school, the beads brightened
under a goldilocks medium
— a not-too-hot, not-toocold
80 degrees — plus lots
of light.
The experiment in Roxanne
Rodgers’ seventh-grade
classroom last week was
among the first of several
ways Summit Hill students
are learning about energy
through the solar panels that
were installed on the roof
before the beginning of the
school year.
“Kids come into the classroom
– especially math or
science — and they’re always
like, ‘Well, when are
we going to use this? Why
do I have to learn this?’”
Rodgers said. “This a really
interesting way to show
them the real world.”
The four 16-foot by 16-
foot panels are thanks to a
$7,000 grant from the Illinois
Clean Energy Community
Foundation awarded to
the school about a year ago.
New to teaching science
last year, Rodgers was inspired
after attending a
teaching workshop through
the National Energy Education
Development Project
and hearing about the possibilities
of solar panels from
fellow teachers. Rodgers
wrote the application, and
Summit Hill Junior High
was one of 23 accepted to
the grant program out of 50
applicant schools.
The panels were installed
on the south, first-floor roof
Social studies and science teacher Roxanne Rodgers discusses how temperature and sunlight affect solar panels.
in July along with help from
Earth, Wind and Solar Energy.
With several sunny or
dreary months of data to dig
through, her students are
now able to measure and
graph how weather impacts
the efficiency of the panels.
So far, last August produced
the most energy
with 146,000 watt hours —
enough to run a refrigerator
for the month — and a drab
December the least. Since
the beginning of 2017, they
have produced 205,151 watt
hours, the equivalent of
powering 1,315 light bulbs
for one night.
“It’s not going to produce
enough energy to make our
electricity bill go down —
it’s only going to produce
enough energy for a few
lightbulbs,” Rodgers said.
The lessons are a precursor
to the eighth-grade curriculum,
Rodgers said, when
students discuss energy
throughout the year, from
atoms to debating nuclear
energy.
“It applies to their lives —
everyone talks about solar,
but I don’t think that they’ve
ever really seen data from a
solar panel,” eighth-grade
science teacher Lori Szymanski
said. “It gives them
meaning, and it’s not just
this far-away kind of energy
in sunny places only.”
Working with real equipment
and hard numbers isn’t
beyond her students, Szymanski
said.
“It’s not overwhelming
and too difficult for kids,”
Please see solar, 13
Seventh-graders (left to right) Mackenzie O’Brien, Brigid Costello and Kylie Shaughnessy
work with small solar panels in Roxanne Rodgers’ class. Photos By Kirsten Onsgard/22nd
Century Media