Teaching Activities

Earth education activities from across all of the sites within the Teach the Earth portal.

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    Middle (6-8)
    Passed Peer Review

    Results 1 - 10 of 35 matches

    Understanding Earthquakes: Comparing seismograms part of EarthScope ANGLE:Educational Materials:Activities
    Jennifer Pickering
    Introductory lesson that contextualizes how multiple instruments provide a more complete picture on an event.

    Grade Level: Intermediate (3-5), High School (9-12), Middle (6-8), College Lower (13-14)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Lab Activity, Classroom Activity
    Subject: Environmental Science:Natural Hazards:Earthquakes, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards, Geoscience, Geology:Geophysics:Seismology
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review

    Mapping Plate Tectonic Boundaries part of Teaching Activities
    Nathan Toke, Utah Valley University
    In this classroom activity, students will work in groups to observe how patterns of topography, bathymetry, earthquake locations and depths, and the location of volcanoes vary across regions of the Earth. They will ...

    Grade Level: High School (9-12), College Lower (13-14), Middle (6-8)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Classroom Activity, Project, Lab Activity
    Subject: Geoscience:Geology:Tectonics
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review

    Reading an Earthquake Seismogram part of EarthScope ANGLE:Educational Materials:Activities
    Jennifer Pickering
    Introductory lesson that deconstructs the information that can be gleaned from a single seismogram.

    Grade Level: College Lower (13-14), Middle (6-8), High School (9-12), Intermediate (3-5)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Classroom Activity, Lab Activity
    Subject: Geoscience:Geology:Tectonics, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards:Earthquakes, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards, Geoscience:Geology:Geophysics:Seismology, Geoscience
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review

    Getting Started with the ShakeNet Data Portal part of EarthScope ANGLE:Educational Materials:Activities
    Jennifer Pickering
    Teacher guide and tutorial for using the RaspberryShake ShakeNet data portal.

    Grade Level: College Lower (13-14), Middle (6-8), Intermediate (3-5), High School (9-12)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Lab Activity, Classroom Activity
    Subject: Geoscience, Geology:Geophysics:Seismology, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards, Natural Hazards:Earthquakes
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review

    Be Smart, Be Prepared! Planning an Emergency Backpack part of EarthScope ANGLE:Educational Materials:Activities
    Bonnie Magura (Portland Public Schools), CEETEP (Cascadia EarthScope Earthquake and Tsunami Education Program), and ANGLE Project
    Participants learn what to do before, during, and after a potentially damaging earthquake. They brainstorm valuable components for an emergency supplies backpack and then present on their ideas. The primary resource is the booklet Are you prepared for the next big EARTHQUAKE in Alaska?

    Grade Level: Informal, Middle (6-8), Intermediate (3-5), General Public, High School (9-12), College Lower (13-14)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Classroom Activity, Lab Activity, Outreach Activity
    Subject: Geoscience:Oceanography:Marine Hazards, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards:Coastal Hazards:Tsunami, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards, Natural Hazards:Volcanism, Earthquakes, Mass Wasting
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review

    Investigating Factors That Affect Tsunami Inundation part of EarthScope ANGLE:Educational Materials:Activities
    Bonnie Magura (Portland Public Schools), Roger Groom (Mt Tabor Middle School), and CEETEP (Cascadia EarthScope Earthquake and Tsunami Education Program)
    Learners modify elements of a tsunami wave tank to investigate the affect that near-coast bathymetry (submarine topography) and coastal landforms have on how far a tsunami can travel inland. Damaging tsunami are most commonly produced by subduction zone earthquakes, such as those that occur in Alaska.

    Grade Level: Middle (6-8), College Lower (13-14), High School (9-12)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Outreach Activity, Lab Activity, Classroom Activity
    Subject: Geoscience:Oceanography:Marine Hazards, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards:Earthquakes, Geoscience, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards, Natural Hazards:Coastal Hazards:Tsunami
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review

    Cupcake Geology: Interpreting Core Samples part of EarthScope ANGLE:Educational Materials:Activities
    Bonnie Magura (Portland Public Schools)
    This activity helps students understand how geoscientists study the Earth below our feet through drilling. Using a large straw as a "drill", students collect samples through different parts of the specially layered cupcake and keep a "log" of the drill core. By defining different colored cake and filling, they can reconstruct what the interior of the cupcake may look like. Students gain an appreciation for the challenges of determining a plausible geologic interpretation with limited data.

    Grade Level: High School (9-12), Middle (6-8), Intermediate (3-5)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Lab Activity, Classroom Activity
    Subject: Geoscience
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review

    Pasta Quake: Exploring Earthquake Magnitude part of EarthScope ANGLE:Educational Materials:Activities
    Paul Doherty (Exploratorium Teacher Institute) and Roger Groom (Mt Tabor Middle School) with improvements by ShakeAlert
    This short activity provides an intuitive introduction to earthquake magnitude using an everyday item--spaghetti. Learners are introduced to the earthquake magnitude scale by breaking different amounts of uncooked noodles. Visual scale of the pasta emphasizes the relative differences between magnitudes with each whole step in magnitude. For older students, the demonstration helps students understand why seismologists use the nonlinear logarithmic scale to best graph the huge range of quantities.

    Grade Level: College Lower (13-14), High School (9-12), Intermediate (3-5), Middle (6-8)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Outreach Activity, Classroom Activity, Lab Activity
    Subject: Geoscience:Geology:Geophysics:Seismology, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards:Earthquakes, Geoscience
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review

    SeismicWaves Viewer & SeismicEruption Software part of EarthScope ANGLE:Educational Materials:Activities
    Roger Groom, Mt Tabor Middle School
    This activity includes both the Seismic Waves Viewer and the Seismic Eruption software to help learners better understand earthquakes, volcanoes, and the structure of the Earth. Seismic Waves is a browser-based tool to visualize the propagation of seismic waves from historic earthquakes through Earth's interior and around its surface. By carefully examining these seismic wave fronts and their propagation, the Seismic Waves tool illustrates how earthquakes can provide evidence that allows us to infer Earth's interior structure. Seismic Eruption shows seismicity (earthquakes) and volcanic activity in space and time from 1960 to present. When the program is running, the user sees lights, which represent earthquakes, flashing on the screen in speeded-up time. The user can control the speed of the action. In addition, the program can show seismicity under Earth's surface in three-dimensional and cross-sectional views. Earthquakes can be selected by magnitude and volcanic eruptions can be selected by volcanic explosivity index. In this way, large earthquakes and large eruptions can be selected to emphasize how different types of plate boundaries are characterized by different magnitudes of earthquakes (e.g. no major or great earthquakes occur on spreading ocean ridges). This lesson plan was developed by , Portland Oregon. Students investigate how seismic waves travel through Earth's internal layers and bounce and bend at internal boundaries between mantle, outer core, and inner core.

    Grade Level: High School (9-12), Middle (6-8), College Lower (13-14)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Lab Activity, Classroom Activity
    Subject: Environmental Science:Natural Hazards:Earthquakes, Geoscience, Geology:Geophysics:Seismology, Environmental Science:Natural Hazards:Volcanism
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review

    Yes Sir, That's My Baby Glacier! part of Teaching Activities
    Christopher Roemmele, West Chester University of Pennsylvania
    Students will create their own glacier, and explore their effect on the land, modeling how they melt, how they move, and erode and deposit sediment. Students will be able to determine and describe isostatic ...

    Grade Level: College Lower (13-14):College Introductory, High School (9-12), Middle (6-8)
    Resource Type: Activities: Activities:Lab Activity
    Subject: Geoscience:Geology:Geomorphology:Landforms/Processes:Glacial/Periglacial
    Activity Review: Passed Peer Review