This activity is part of the On the Cutting Edge Peer Reviewed Teaching Activities collection. (view details)

This activity was selected for the On the Cutting Edge Reviewed Teaching Collection

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 https://serc.carleton.edu/teachearth/activity_review.html.

Initial Publication Date: May 24, 2018 | Reviewed: August 4, 2022 (see revision history: 2 events)

Measure a Changing Volcano

Description

This hands-on demonstration illustrates how GPS can be used to measure the inflation and deflation of a volcano. Volcanoes may inflate when magma rises closer to the surface and deflate when the pressure dissipates or after an eruption.

Measure a Changing Volcano Demonstration (Acrobat (PDF) 645kB May22 18)

Video of the demonstration: YouTube or MP4 Video (MP4 Video 33.9MB May23 18)

Context

This can be used as in class exercise with upper elementary to high school students. It also makes a great interactive outreach demonstration.

Teaching Notes

Although you can use flour, corn starch, or drywall powder, these substances have more allergy and irritant potential. Thus sand is generally preferable.
Balloon pumps to inflate the balloon (i.e. magma) are definitely preferable for public events where the presenter may need to do the demonstration multiple times. However, they are not as necessary for classrooms where the inflation may only be done once or twice.
The "Junior Scientist" activity booklet.pdf (Acrobat (PDF) 438kB Jun15 18) can be printed and used to record the distance between stations as well as general observations.