Teaching About Energy in Geoscience Courses

We may be poised on the brink of a shift in energy use and energy policy. Pressing issues like the longevity of petroleum supplies and rapidly expanding global markets competing for finite energy supplies are concurrent with considerations such as climate change policy and a push toward domestic energy production. Geoscience plays a role in many facets of energy science and policy; hence our students need solid footing on which to navigate through this complex subject. Whether as citizens and consumers or as scientific leaders in the field, today's students will play important roles in the future of energy.

Resources for Teaching about Energy

• Classroom and lab activities contributed by faculty
  
• Courses about energy - a new collection
• Energy visualization collection - videos, animations and graphics about a wide range of energy types
  
• Recommended resources - useful websites recommended by faculty who teach about energy
  
• Books for teaching about energy from the popular press
• Ideas for teaching about energy generated a the 2009 workshop
• Teaching energy with quantitative skills - a selection of activities with a quantitative approach for teaching energy concepts
  
• Plans for new approaches to teaching energy developed at the 2009 workshop
  
• Do you teach about energy in your courses? Let us know about your course, your favorite activity, or references or websites that you use.
  

Join us for a follow-up Energy Workshop to be held at the 2010 GSA annual meeting in Denver.

This one-day workshop will be a follow-up to the Cutting Edge workshop Teaching about Energy in Geoscience Courses held in May 2009 at the University of Wyoming. The workshop will provide opportunities to learn more about energy issues, as well as focus on how we teach about energy and geoscience. Participants will share and discuss current examples, while exploring how we might better integrate energy in geoscience courses and beyond. Workshop participants will also collaborate to create or refine materials for classroom use. More information will be available by summer 2010.

Recent workshop: Teaching About Energy in Geoscience Courses: Current Research and Pedagogy

May 17-20, 2009, at the University of Wyoming in Laramie, WY

• See the workshop program for links to presentations, posters, discussion outcomes and photos
• Plans and preliminary designs for new approaches to teaching energy can be found in the results from working groups
• A page of teaching ideas contains many different energy topics and creative ways to teach them
• Stay tuned for more resources and activities to be developed in conjunction with this workshop.