1st Grade Geography and Ham Radio – KPACS2020

On Wednesday, January 31, 2018, the Richardson Wireless Klub hosted an educational net on the club’s UHF Fusion repeater where area schools were invited to check in and “tour the world”. This was the first in a series of weekly nets where Philip Cook KA5GKL the net control operator will use the repeater’s WiresX network to link to a different country’s room or node corresponding to that week’s geography lesson and call CQ asking for stations who are willing to talk to students about ham radio.

Philip said “This week the kids studied Canada so we linked into the CQ-Canada room and Jack Olsen VE7GDE answered our call.”

“The kids were grinning ear to ear as we looked on our map for British Columbia.”

“Gus, 5, said “he talks just like us!”  Next week is France, he’ll enjoy the accents.”

“They all told Jack their names and learned that it was raining near Vancouver but they told him it was clear here. Ella, 6, didn’t understand how it could be raining there but not here…learning in action.”

This week three students braved the microphone and Philip held the microphone; next week they’ll practice pushing the PTT before speaking and holding it until they’re done. The idea is to get them interested in not only geography but amateur radio as well and start teaching some good operating practices (like speaking one at a time).

Initial input from parents is that the students were still talking about it when they went home and thought is was “really cool” and we “talked to someone far away.”