Initial Publication Date: December 14, 2015

Leigh Stearns: Using Ice Mass and Sea Level Changes in Environmental Geology at the University of Kansas

About this course

An introductory geoscience course

students

One 3-hour sessions

per week

Public University

Syllabus (Acrobat (PDF) 107kB Oct5 15)

Show Description of Environmental Geology

This is an introductory geoscience course. There are no prerequisites and no assumption of an existing knowledge of geology, although students are expected to be able to perform basic
mathematical calculations. This course presents environmental topics in geology that have an impact on humans, such as natural hazards (earthquakes, volcanoes, floods), resource extraction (mining, fossil fuels, groundwater pumping), and pollution (climate change, water quality).

Course goals and content:

Show Course goals and content

I hope that by the end of this course, students will be informed citizens with the ability to make
educated decisions regarding their interaction with the environment. Students will also be able to:
- analyze geologic records of a region and predict the risk of future natural disasters;
- explain potential impacts of geologic events on society and potential impacts of human activities on Earth;
- understand how geologic processes influence decisions that affect their daily lives, whether it has to do with house purchase, resource utilization, local waste disposal issues, school curriculum, or many other issues.

Introductory Statement

The course I had planned to test this module in was canceled, so I ended up teaching the module in my colleague's Environmental Geology course (a course I used to teach). For three consecutive weeks, I took over the Environmental Geology course and taught (nearly all of) the Ice Mass and Sea Level Changes. I have taught a number of climate and ice sheet mass balance classes while at KU, but have struggled finding good activities for students to do in class. Working on this GETSI module really helped me think about scaffolding the learning that students do and creating activities that build throughout the module.

Overall, the students seemed very engaged in the material and thoughtful in their responses. There were more students with a science background in the course than I had anticipated, and I think they found some of the material too basic. After the first two units, I did slightly adjust the material based on their capability. Since I was the "substitute teacher" and the students were not accustomed to working in groups, I did encounter some resistance to the active and group-learning approach. The students did the work, but I had to really encourage them to talk and collaborate within their groups.

My Experience Teaching with GETSI Materials

The students enjoyed looking at data and thinking about how data inform real models and projections. Unit 1 really helped students think about the bigger picture of sea level rise and get used to participating in class discussions.

Relationship of GETSI materials to my course

Unfortunately, the course I was hoping to test this module in was canceled the term I was supposed to test. As a result, I taught this module in a colleague's "Environmental Geology" course while she was at a workshop. This course meets once a week for 3 hours (7–10 pm) and is for non-majors. This arrangement worked out well but had two clear drawbacks. First, the students did not work very well in groups (their primary instructor does not have them work in groups). I spent a bit of time initiating group discussions and encouraging them to collaborate. Second, the goals of the module did not really fit into my colleague's course goals very clearly. The students seemed to like the GETSI material and activities, but it probably seemed disjointed to them.

A Unit-by-Unit Breakdown of How I Taught this Module

Unit 1: I did not modify this unit and it took 35 minutes to complete. I put students in small groups and they each read three Bangladesh vignettes (hard copies) and then went through the questions as a group. I had some copying woes, so not all of the groups had all of the vignettes, but it did not really matter. Making these vignettes assigned homework reading is probably a better idea. After ~20 minutes we discussed some of the questions as a class. The students were very engaged and talkative for Unit 1.

Unit 2: I did not modify this unit and it took roughly 1 hour to complete (I did Units 1 and 2 on the same day). We started with the "Part 1: What causes sea level to change" presentation. The students could not think of four contributors to sea level rise, so we jumped into a discussion pretty quickly. I went through the The Math You Need presentations, which, judging from the students' expressions was too basic for them. I gave students hard copy handouts of the activities, which they completed in groups. I am glad we went through the IPCC slides because, prior to those slides and the subsequent discussions, students thought that climate models basically just did linear interpolations. It was good to show them how complex climate models can be.

Unit 3: This unit takes the longest (~2.5 hours) to complete and prepare for. I did the whole unit, but not all the assessments at the end of the unit. Each student was assigned to either Group A, B, or C and received a printed activity sheet for their respective group. The students could then do the activity with their other group members (all Group As were sitting together, etc). However, most students just completed the assignment on their own. After this initial activity was done (about an hour), we reshuffled the class so that each new group had a representative from Group A, B, and C and they answered the compiled activity as a group. In this case the students did work well as a group, but I did have to police their answers to some of the questions since many gave "minimal effort" answers at first.

Unit 4: I did Units 4 and 5 together during one class period; Unit 4 took ~1 hour to complete. As a result, I slightly modified Unit 4, and only did part of Unit 5. Students did Part 1 of Unit 4 (animation and questions) as homework; we did not do the supplemental calculation exercise or go through the GPS slides. I did show the sea level slides and we did the MCQs for the summative assessment. The students will get other summative assessment questions in their final exam. Overall, the students seemed to like Unit 4 and were engaged and curious throughout the activity.

Unit 5: I heavily adapted Unit 5 since I was short on time. We only spent ~15 minutes going through the New York City case study and chatting about the adaptation plans.

Assessments

I did at least one summative assessment at the end of each unit—usually a multiple choice question, in the interest of time. Students had to complete all of the Antarctic Summative Assessment as part of their final exam in this course. I was very surprised with how well they did on this final assessment.

Outcomes

I was hoping students would learn some quantitative skills, understand components of sea level rise and ice sheet mass loss, and be able to interpret and describe climate graphs. I was pleased to see that students were able to do these things, and showed increased interest in climate processes, at the end of the module.

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