Field Trips | Learning Labs

A small soap bubble protruding from a green water bottle. In the background is a student watching curiously.

Learning Labs are what we call our field trip program offerings. Select the Learning Lab that best meets the needs of your students for your 2-hour experience, which includes an exhibit exploration and classroom activity. The 45-minute classroom activity incorporates hands-on activities and has been specifically designed for different grade bands. During the field trip, students will also go on a 45-minute exploration of the NSF NCAR Mesa Lab that aligns with the subjects from the selected Learning Lab. This provides an opportunity for more in-depth learning about your topic. Our labs are designed for PreK-12th grades and are aligned to Next Generation Science Standards. Field trips to the NSF NCAR Mesa Lab are entirely free, but transportation and lunch are not included.

Summer 2025 Learning Lab

Earth’s Atmosphere: Ozone Inspectors (Grades PreK-12th) 🌲

Learn about Earth’s extraordinary atmosphere and how changes in the atmosphere can impact plants, animals, and humans. Become an explorer at NSF NCAR through our educational ozone garden and the Walter Orr Roberts Weather Trail. Students can see the presence of ground-level ozone on plant leaves in our ozone garden, which will lead them to discoveries about air quality. Explore like a scientist right in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains.

Note: A significant portion of this summer program takes place outside, so students will need to dress appropriately for the weather and wear shoes for walking on a dirt trail. If the weather is severe enough to restrict us from going outside that day, we will switch to an indoor experience.

School Year Learning Labs

Cloud Detectives (Grades PreK-K):🌲 Send your students’ curious minds soaring as they explore the science of clouds. Through song, story, art, and play, students will learn about the many different types of clouds. Students will touch a cloud, learn about the power of the Sun, and discover how much a cloud weighs.
Air: A Piece of the Weather Puzzle (Grades 1-3): Did you know a typical cumulonimbus cloud can weigh as much as 253 blue whales? How does it stay up in the sky?! Explore how the sun affects our Earth’s weather with an interactive experiment comparing hot and cold air. Transform your students into cloud detectives as we explore this cloudy mystery together and learn how air behaves when it changes temperature.
Weather Trail Discovery (Grades 2-3):🌲 Calling all weather explorers! Students embark upon an outdoor science scavenger hunt to see firsthand how weather impacts our surroundings. While walking on the Walter Orr Roberts Weather Trail, we’ll use scientific instruments to look for and learn about the weather wonders in NSF NCAR’s backyard.
- Note: This program is not recommended for groups with wheelchairs because we cannot adapt the route on the Walter Orr Roberts Weather Trail.
Sky Sleuths: Inside Weather Data (Grades 3-5):🌲 Put your detective hats on as we discover what clues scientists use to create weather forecasts. We’ll explore how meteorologists gather weather data from around the world and use supercomputers and models to create the forecasts that help us plan our lives and stay safe. Your meteorologists-in-training will team up to gather real weather data outside the NSF NCAR classroom, and then graph and analyze their atmospheric data.
Simply Shocking (Grades 3-5): Nature provides a spectacular show when lightning strikes. Students explore this hair-raising phenomenon to discover what lightning is and how it forms. While there are many kinds of lightning, there are simple ways we can stay safe from this stunning weather hazard.
Climate Heroes: My Place in the Earth System (Grades 3-5):🌲 Oceans, ice sheets, forests, mountains, clouds, and more are all a part of our Earth systems. They cover our beautiful planet in an amazing, complex system that is rapidly changing with our warming planet. Turn your students into climate superheroes-in-training as they learn the basics of the science of climate change, how our Earth systems are all connected, and what actions we can all take together to be part of the solution.
What's Up with Climate Change? Earth's Changing Weather, Over Time (Grades 6-8): Explore the basics of climate change, including greenhouse gases and their contribution to rising global temperatures. Students become climate scientists for a day, analyzing climate data proxies like tree rings and ice cores, and exploring some of the impacts of climate change in Colorado.
Engineering for Climate Change: A Severe Weather Design Challenge (Grades 6-12): Calling all engineers, inventors, and designers! The extreme weather expected with our changing climate presents many challenges, which can also be considered opportunities for innovation to help our communities stay safe. Your class of budding engineers will get crafty and curious while building structures to protect people from extreme weather and learn how researchers at NSF NCAR rely on creativity and teamwork to explore our amazing planet.
For grades 9-12, we welcome individualized program requests. Email our School and Public Programs team at (link sends email)spp@ucar.edu to talk about setting up a field trip for this age group.