Measuring Plate Motion with GPS: Iceland | Lessons on Plate Tectonics
Shelley E Olds, EarthScope Consortium
This lesson teaches middle and high school students to understand the architecture of GPS—from satellites to research quality stations on the ground. This is done with physical models and a presentation. Then students learn to interpret data for the station's position through time ("time series plots"). Students represent time series data as velocity vectors and add the vectors to create a total horizontal velocity vector. They apply their skills to discover that the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is rifting Iceland. They cement and expand their understanding of GPS data with an abstraction using cars and maps. Finally, they explore GPS vectors in the context of global plate tectonics.

Site Selection: Analysis and Modeling Scenerios
Gary Coutu, West Chester University of Pennsylvania
Gary Coutu, West Chester University/Department of Geography and Planning Summary Three assignments explore the basics of GIS analysis, using a site selection activity. These assignments introduce the use of ...

Detecting Cascadia's changing shape with GPS | Lessons on Plate Tectonics
Shelley E Olds, EarthScope Consortium
Research-grade Global Positioning Systems (GPS) allow students to deduce that Earth's crust is changing shape in measurable ways. From data gathered by EarthScope's Plate Boundary Observatory, students discover that the Pacific Northwest of the United States and coastal British Columbia — the Cascadia region - are geologically active: tectonic plates move and collide; they shift and buckle; continental crust deforms; regions warp; rocks crumple, bend, and will break.

Boolean Raster Well Exercise
Enrique Gomezdelcampo, Bowling Green State University-Main Campus
Enrique Gomezdelcampo, Bowling Green State University Summary This is a paper and pencil exercise using boolean raster grids. The exercise gives students a better understanding of how the GIS software works. ...

Projections and Vector Analysis: Biotic and abiotic properties along the Clark Fork and Blackfoot
Alia Wade, The University of Montana-Missoula
Alisa Wade, University of Montana Summary Lab to introduce projections and vector analysis via studying local abiotic and biotic characteristics. Context Type and level of course GIS in geosciences; upper-division ...

Pangaea Breakup
Steve Whitmeyer, James Madison University; Mladen Dorevic, Old Dominion University
A Google Earth animation files was developed to show the Pangaea breakup. The animation is utilized to illustrate the evidence for plate tectonics and plate motion. Three student exercises are build around this ...

Reasons for the Seasons
Declan De Paor, Old Dominion University; Steve Whitmeyer, James Madison University
Reasons for the seasons (RFTS for short) is an interactive learning resource that leverages the popular Google Earth virtual globe. It is designed to help students and members of the public visualize and understand ...

A Grand Tour of the Ocean Basins
Declan De Paor, Old Dominion University
The Tour Stops are arranged in a teaching sequence, starting with continental rifting and incipient ocean basin formation in East Africa and the Red Sea and ending with the oldest surviving fragments of oceanic ...

Grand Tour of the Terrestrial Planets
Declan De Paor, Old Dominion University
In the age of publicly funded space exploration involving several national space agencies, knowing about the highest mountain in the solar system is as basic to geospatial literacy as knowing about the highest ...

Apartment information system
Wei Luo, Northern Illinois University
Wei Luo, Northern Illinois University Summary The purpose of this project is to familiarize the student with the entire process of creating a GIS project from data capture through analysis and generating the final ...