Virtual Lab: "Big Nine" Silicates in Thin Section part of Teach the Earth:Teaching Activities
Catherine Macris, Indiana University-Purdue University-Indianapolis
This virtual lab activity uses Virtual Microscope to help students create their own ranked lists of diagnostic properties for the "Big Nine" silicate minerals/groups, which includes quartz, muscovite, ...

Gestures for Miller Indices part of Spatial Thinking Workbook:Teaching Activities
Carol Ormand Ph.D., Carleton College
Students use one hand to gesture crystallographic axes and the other hand to represent planes designated by Miller Indices.

Understanding Crystal Symmetry via Gestures part of Spatial Thinking Workbook:Teaching Activities
Carol Ormand Ph.D., Carleton College
Students use a small mirror to explore the meaning of mirror symmetry, and then use their hands to gesture mirror planes for a group of familiar objects. They also explore the rotational symmetry of a group of familiar objects, and then use their hands to gesture the rotational axes and rotation. Finally, they use gestures to show mirror and rotational symmetry of wooden crystal models.

Identifying Symmetry in 2-D Drawings part of Activities
Dexter Perkins, University of North Dakota-Main Campus
These three activities are problem sets that make students think about symmetry in 2-D. They all involve identifying symmetry from drawings. I purposely omitted jargony words/phrases such as lattice, unit cell, ...

Making Solid Solutions with Alkali Halides (and Breaking Them) part of Activities
John Brady, Smith College
In this exercise, the class will grow a variety of crystals of the same mineral, but with different chemical compositions. These crystals will be made from mixtures of halite eNaCI)and sylvite (KCI) that are melted ...

Observational Skills in a Simple Crystal Growing Experiment part of Geoscience in Two-year Colleges:Activities
Richard Gottfried, Frederick Community College
Students grow crystals and identify the crystal system by observing their basic geometric form. Students all research crytallization processes.

Research Project for Mineralogy part of Activities
Wendy Panero, Ohio State University-Main Campus
The assignment allows for open ended exploration of a topic of interest in geosciences in which one or more mineral's chemistry and/or crystal structure is significant to understanding that geoscience problem. ...

Space Group Symmetry part of Activities
Joseph Smyth, University of Colorado at Boulder
This assignment tasks students with determining symmetry axes and identifying Hermann-Mauguin symbols for space groups based on a symmetry diagram.

Point Groups part of Activities
Joseph Smyth, University of Colorado at Boulder
This mineralogy problem set tasks students with determining the point group Hermann-Mauguin symbol and crystal system for crystal stereograms.

Comparing Phyllosilicate Structures part of Spatial Thinking Workbook:Teaching Activities
Carol Ormand Ph.D., Carleton College
Students compare the chemistry and structures of biotite, muscovite, and chlorite.

Comparing Quartz Polymorphs part of Spatial Thinking Workbook:Teaching Activities
Carol Ormand Ph.D., Carleton College
Students compare the structures of low-temperature and high-temperature polymorphs of quartz, relating their differences to symmetry and crystal systems.

Better Living Through Minerals: X-Ray Diffraction of Household Products part of Activities
Barb Dutrow, Louisiana State University
X-ray diffraction is a quick and valuable tool for identifying minerals. Minerals are an integral portion of our everyday life, in addition to composing our planet! They help bring electricity into our homes and ...

Exercises in the Geochemical Kinetics of Mineral-Water Reactions part of Activities
Michael Velbel, Michigan State University
This module consists of a laboratory exercise and related homework problems on geochemical kinetics of mineral-solution reactions for undergraduate mineralogy. Students measure the grain sizes of equant halite ...

Exploring phyllosilicate structures with polyhedral models part of Activities
James Rougvie, Beloit College
In this exercise, students build polyhedral models to learn about phyllosilicate structures and how they relate to physical properties. This directed-discovery activity is a very 'hands-on' experience ...

An introduction to XRD using the MSA Crystal Structure Database part of Activities
Zeb Page, Oberlin College
An XRD lab/problem set that makes use of the free online MSA crystal structure database rather than proprietary software to identify powder XRD patterns.