The Teaching Quantitative Skills in the Geosciences website has not been significantly updated since 2011. We are preserving the web pages here because they still contain useful ideas and content. But be aware that the site may have out of date information.
You can find more recent and extensive resources on the Teach the Earth website.

Key Quantitative Skills

The two groups at the workshop, Surface Processes and Climate Change, independently considered what they would consider key quantitative skills for their particular disciplines. Some skills were cited by both groups.
Both:
Basic Statistics
Graphing and reading graphs
Modeling

Surface:
Understanding Scale and scale conversions
Units and unit conversions
Scientific notation and significant figures
Spreadsheets for data compilation, simple calculations, modeling
Uncertainty and natural variability
Accuracy vs. precision
Rates of Change

Climate:
Reading Equations
Back of the Envelope Calculations
Time Series
Directional Data
Exponential Growth