Getting Ready

To prepare for the program, you might want to do the following:

• Review the Program Leader's Guide.
• Watch the video Race to Save the Planet: #3, Do We Really Want to Live This Way?. This video provides a good overview of air pollution. (We recommend that you show the first 15 minutes of this film to participants.)
• Read the Background Information section of this guide, as well as the enclosed articles.
• Wear the ECO Badge and try filling in the data collection sheet.
• Build an ozonometer.
• Build a solar-powered car.
• Think about how the activities suit your style as a program leader and how the activities will "work" with your participants, given their interests, backgrounds, and ages. You might want to modify things a bit to ensure a good all-around fit.
• Consider the timing of activities. (We've indicated how much time we think each activity might take; however, some activities, particularly discussions that turn out to be lively, might take more time than anticipated.) We recognize that there's a lot to do; fitting everything in may be a challenge in time management, depending on the size and composition of your group.

Spreading the Word

One way you can multiply the impact of your program is to have the media cover your program. This way, the general public will learn about the ozone problem. You will want to arrange, ahead of time, one or maybe two of the following ways in which your Smog Watch program can work with your local TV weather forecaster:

• Report air quality measurements made by families using the ECO Badges and/or the ozonometers.
• Report air quality data collected by local monitoring agencies.
• Provide information about ground-level ozone -- its causes and effects and the influence of weather patterns on its distribution.
• Show the families in action at your museum/science center. Families will be participating in a number of interesting activities, including:
  • building an "ozonometer" which uses the cracking of rubber to measure ozone concentrations
  • discussing the meaning of the ozone data they have collected
  • exploring health effects of air pollution
  • building a solar-powered model car as an example of alternative thinking about modes of transportation that could improve air quality.
• Show families in action at home (between sessions) doing the following:
  • using the ozonometer at home to measure ozone concentrations
  • wearing ECO Badges (that turn color when exposed to ozone) to measure the amount of ozone to which individuals are exposed over a period of time.

It's up to you and your forecaster to decide on something that is interesting, newsworthy, and fun. (A few words of caution: While it's quite exciting for participants when a TV station films a session, filming can be time-consuming and eat up the time originally designated for activities. If you decide to have filming during a session, you'll most likely want to lengthen that session so that there's plenty of time to do all the activities.)

Materials and Facilities

Note that in the "Exploring Our Breathing" activity, you will need to have access to a source of running water and that for the solar car activity, you will need access to electrical outlets.

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