Campus Mapping Tour
Helge Alsleben
, TCU
Author Profile
This activity is part of the On the Cutting Edge Peer Reviewed Teaching Activities collection.
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This activity has received positive reviews in a peer review process involving five review categories. The five categories included in the process are
- Scientific Accuracy
- Alignment of Learning Goals, Activities, and Assessments
- Pedagogic Effectiveness
- Robustness (usability and dependability of all components)
- Completeness of the ActivitySheet web page
For more information about the peer review process itself, please see http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/review.html.
This page first made public: Oct 17, 2008
Summary
This exercise allows students to learn how to produce a geologic map. Students will pair up and explore campus as a "virtual" field area. This works well in areas where outcrop is generally sparse, but decorative rocks and building materials provide on campus "outcrops". The exercise needs to customized to ones individual, unique setting.
Context
Audience
Structural Geology (undergraduate geology majors)
Skills and concepts that students must have mastered
Students should have basic rocks and mineral identification skills, basic understanding of geologic time scale, and know what geologic contacts they might encounter in the field.
How the activity is situated in the course
One of the first labs. Students are introduced to basic field skills. This prepares them for 2 weekend field trips taking later in the semester.
Goals
Content/concepts goals for this activity
Learn basic field skills including reading maps, draw contacts on maps, make observations.
Higher order thinking skills goals for this activity
Exercise allows students to interpret basic structural map patterns and contact relationships.
Other skills goals for this activity
Use of geologic compass
Description of the activity/assignment
Reading and constructing geologic maps is one skill that every geologists has to master. Initially, this means that we have to understand the symbols that are used on geologic maps. Once we know the general meaning of these symbols, we will have to learn how to measure and plot them. The measuring is generally done using a magnetic compass. Finally, we have to plot the data on a map so that others understand the geology based on our mapping.
Determining whether students have met the goals
Download teaching materials and tips
- Activity Description/Assignment (Acrobat (PDF) 352kB Oct17 08)
