Barbara Tewksbury

Hamilton College

Undergraduate required course in Structural Geology for geology majors

Because students take notes in the field as concept sketches, they must know in advance how to make a concept sketch - it wastes valuable field time to have to teach this to students in the field. You can download a description of concept sketches and how to make them from the "Download teaching materials and tips" at the bottom of this web page.

As a wrap-up for a field trip that takes place at the end of the semester.

There are no specific new content goals for this assignment. Students apply what they have learned over the course of the semester.

Creating figures as concept sketches that communicate clearly and effectively.

Prior to tackling this assignment, students have been out in the field at a series of outcrops in eastern New York and western Vermont, where they have made observations, collected data, and taken notes as concept sketches. A concept sketch has a central graphic (in this case, a field sketch done by the students) surrounded by concept captions that convey the observations made, plus data collected, and the interpretations of those observations. Because many of my students still struggle to separate observations and interpretations, I commonly have them underline their observations in one color and their interpretations in another. Concept sketches are an outstanding way to have students take notes in the field because they have to decide what to illustrate in order to convey the points that they want to make. In the downloads under "Teaching materials and tips" below, you can download more information about concept sketches.

After returning from the field, students put together a set of concept sketches that convey not only their field observations and interpretations but that also integrate thin sections and a regional tectonic model. Students have the option of using field photos in their concept sketches, and I also provide photomicrographs and plate tectonic block models for them to incorporate. Students also make a concept sketch from their cross sections, with concept captions that provide evidence for their subsurface interpretations. Each student also writes a brief introduction providing the context for their set of concept sketches.

In the past, I have had students write illustrated field reports or field guides based on their field work, but I have found that I learn much more about what students have learned and their abilities to explain it by reading through their concept sketches. These concept sketch collections are also MUCH faster to grade than pages of text with the occasional figure!

I have also been struck by the fact that my students' concept sketches convey the sense that they are really anxious to show me what they learned in the field. In the download at the bottom of this web page, I have included scans of some of their concept sketches at the end of the actual assignment. Please note that most of them were originally done on 11x17 size paper.

Students are graded individually on their set of concept sketches with accompanying introduction

Johnson, J. K., & Reynolds, S. J. (2005), Concept sketches–using student-and instructor-generated, annotated sketches for learning, teaching, and assessment in geology courses: Journal of Geoscience Education, v. 53, no. 1, p. 85-95. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.5408/1089-9995-53.1.85