Mercalli Earthquake Activity
A jigsaw process that allows students to analyze first person descriptions of earthquakes and assess several earthquake features.

Earthquake Machine Demonstration
This classroom activity is a demonstration where students predict what will happen under various conditions. The "Earthquake Machine" shows relationships between stress, strain, friction along the fault ...

Earthquake resistant design
In groups of two, the students design and build a three-story building to be as earthquake resistant as possible. Using an in-house designed and built shaker table, we load each floor of the building based on area ...

Earthquakes
This activity uses geoinformatics to understand the world around us with an emphasis on earthquakes.

Tsunami assignment
Students read reports about potential sources for tsunamis on the US east coast and compare them with previously discussed dangers for the west cost.

Historical Volcanic Eruptions
Students are asked to individually research and write a paper on a historical volcanic eruption and then are formed into groups to create a 10 minute stand-alone PowerPoint presentation which is shown and discussed ...

The Epicenter of a Southwestern Earthquake
This activity guides students to use the measured difference in P and S wave velocities to locate the epicenter of a minor earthquake in the Southwestern United States. Click here to view the full activity on the ...

Walking Field Trip to the San Andreas Fault
Due to our University's unique location approximately one mile from the nearest trace of the San Andreas Fault, we are able to take students on a walking field trip to the San Andreas. On the trip we set the ...

Liquefaction Live! activity
In this activity, students are provided with equipment and instructions for creating a simulation of liquefaction. The activity is great for students because it first asks them to reflect of what they know about ...

Field Exercise - Caddy Canyon Debris Flows
Field Exercise - Caddy Canyon Debris Flow(s): Glenn Thackray, Idaho State University Intended Audience: This assignment has been used in a senior graduate-level geomorphology course with lower and upper division ...

Diagnosing Landslide Hazard
Diagnosing Landslide Hazard: Les Hasbargen, SUNY College at Oneonta Intended Audience: This activity is designed for upper division Geology, Earth Science, and Earth Science education majors. Location: Landslide ...

Lab 3: Normal Climate Patterns
The lab activity described here was created by Betsy Youngman of Phoenix Country Day School and LuAnn Dahlman of TERC for the EarthLabs project. Activity Summary and Learning Objectives Students generate and ...

Hurricane Tracking
This is a homework assignment that focuses student attention on ongoing hurricane/tropical storm development, often during the height of hurricane season. The students are directed to a web site (I like ...

Forecasting Lake Effect Snow in Lake Superior region
This exercise is designed to present the realistic problems of forecasting weather. Lake effect snows are hard to forecast because they depend on information that isn't part of the regular set of information ...

Hurricane Investigation
This is a simple homework assignment that will reinforce topics discussed in lecture as well as enabling students to search and analyze information on the web.

Climate Change and Atlantic Hurricanes: A GIS Inquiry
Students make hypotheses about how hurricane numbers, locations, or intensities have been changing, and then use hurricane tracks, wind speed, barometric pressure, and dates to test their hypotheses.

Tropical Cyclones, Sea Surface Temperature, and Beyond
The activity will use historical data of sea surface temperature and tropical cyclone origin and/or tracks to identify trends. Students use Arc GIS to explore projected SST changes and predict areas where tropical ...

How Slab Dip Affects the Location of Volcanoes
Students will plot the locations of earthquakes on the top of subducting slabs to determine slab dip and will then develop hypotheses regarding the relationship between slab dip, the depth of the slab, and volcanic activity on the surface.

Volcanoes of Central America
Volcano distribution and tectonics at a convergent margin: Central American volcanoes

Air-sea Interactions: Activities in Oceanography
This online set of activities help students learn properties of ocean waves, wind-wave relationships and properties of tsunamis.