Spreadsheets Across the Curriculum module/Geology of National Parks course. Students use foundational math to calculate such earthquake-related numbers as fault displacement rate and earthquake recurrence interval associated with the San Andreas Fault at Point Reyes National Seashore.

This site features a report on the historic 1891 discovery of a giant Cretaceous fossil shark (Cretoxyrhina) and the recent excavation of a similar specimen from the chalk deposits of Gove County, Kansas. Several photos, illustrations, references and relevant links accompany this thorough account of the shark's discovery and excavation.

The GigaPan Virtual Field Trip is used as a pre and post assessment of student understanding of basic physical geology concepts and processes. Students are directed to a GigaPan image of Peyto Lake, Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada and asked to list observations and provide interpretations based on their observations.

The students have been lectured to about glacial processes, but the homework was given prior to a lecture about glacial landforms. A field trip surveying the glacial landforms of SE South Dakota was just completed. The students must draw upon their knowledge and utlize other sources to interpret the landforms they see in the imagery.
Designed for a geomorphology course

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A jigsaw style activity where students learn the basics of topographic maps and teach their peers about glacial landforms through use of an augmented reality sandbox.

Students use historical data on the extent of the Grinnell Glacier in Glacier National Park to estimate when the glacier will melt completely.

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Students describe and interpret glacial features exposed in gravel pits and outcrops.

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The goal of this assignment is for students to recognize that adding some randomization and "noise" to a model yields different results each time we run the model, and we can pull some useful statistics from these model results. This introduces the concept of a Monte Carlo method to the students.

Using a glacier proxy, students design an experiment to connect glacial erosion with glacial flow. Students choose from a variety of materials, determined what question they want their experiment or experiments to answer, design the procedure, test the experiment, and write up a lab report on the experiment.

This activity is a 3-day leasson that involves classroom discussion and field exploration of glacial activity in a school forest.

Students are given a problem about a relatively new treatment for cancer, Gleevec, and asked to apply and synthesize what they have learned about cell signaling and the eukaryotic cell cycle to explain why this targeted treatment works to prevent cell division with fewer side effects than traditional chemotherapeutic agents.

Prior to this assignment, students read Chapter 2 (Earth's Climate System Today) of W. Ruddiman's Earth's Climate book and online information about the TRMM dataset. In the computer lab, students download the instructions and the pre-processed dataset from course website. The lab assignment consists of GIS raster algebra operations used to generate average precipitation rasters and to calculate anomalies. Throughout the assignment, students are asked to interpret and explain global precipitation patterns.

In this project students learn through lecture, video, and sketching about the Coriolis effect, the "Six-Cell Generalized Global Atmospheric Circulation Model", the shifting ITCZ, the Indian Monsoon, and its impact on the day-to-day lives of the people of India.
The outcomes for this assignment are aligned with course-specific outcomes articulated in the Minnesota Transfer Curriculum. They are:

Discuss/compare characteristics of diverse cultures and environments in the context of ocean science.
Explain the basic structure and function of the ocean realm, the impact of humans on it, and the impact of the ocean realm on humans.

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This mini-module describes a two-day mini-unit integrating global climate changein Woolf's book Orlando: A Biography. The module connects historical climate records to literary descriptions, discusses the difference between weather and climate, and invites conversation about climate-driven trends in phenology.

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This module introduces students to the basic science of climate change, as well as the concepts of vulnerability and adaptation in the context of climate change in different regions of the world.

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Title page for Global / Diversity Learning in Chemistry

Provenance: Adapted from the New York Times
Reuse: If you wish to use this item outside this site in ways that exceed fair use (see http://fairuse.stanford.edu/) you must seek permission from its creator.

Students write a research paper (750--1000 words) on a topic of global importance in chemistry, technology, health, environmental sustainability, or another related field. The paper explores the issue by identifying several communities affected by the issue in different ways. At the culmination of the project, students draw on a variety of media resources to describe the several perspectives, and conclude by advocating one approach to addressing the issue. Students assemble their own resources through library research, and are free to model their work on examples provided on the course Blackboard website.

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This module series is designed to teach introductory-level college-age geology students about the basic processes and dynamics that produce earthquakes. Students learn about how and why earthquakes are distributed at plate boundaries using 3D visualizations of real data. These 3D visualizations were designed to allow students to more easily visualize and experience complex and highly visual geologic concepts. 3D visualizations allow students to examine features of the Earth from many different scales and perspectives, and to view both the space and time distributions of events. For example, students can view the earth from the perspective of the entire solar system, or from one point on the Earth's surface, and can visualize how earthquakes along a fault occur through time. By teaching about earthquakes and plate tectonics using a real data set that students can visualize in three-dimensions, students learn how scientists analyze large data sets to look for patterns and test hypotheses. At the end of this module students will understand how earthquakes are distributed on Earth, and how different types of plate boundaries result in different magnitudes and distributions of earthquakes.

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At the half-way point in the course, students will have knowledge of the biology and ecology of fisheries around the world. Students will individually select a local fishery of interest and choose a stakeholder who participates in some capacity in the fishery. Students will contact this stakeholder, introduce themselves and the project, and arrange an interview. Students will be required to formulate a research question that the interview seeks to answer and write at least 10 questions prior to the interview. After the interview, students will answer their research question using the material gained in the interview, and other relevant literature.

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Geological processes at the mid-ocean ridges are responsible for the bulk of the Earth's heat loss and volcanic activity. The compositions of materials erupted at these locations, dominantly mid-ocean ridge basalts (MORB's), have profound implications for the inner workings of the Earth's mantle, the construction of oceanic crust, and global plate tectonics. In this exercise, students replicate a portion of a classic paper on MORB geochemistry [Klein and Langmuir, 1987] , but using a much larger global geochemical dataset downloaded from the PETDB database. Through a series of activities and questions, students are encouraged to think about the petrologic and geodynamic processes controlling the composition of Earth's most abundant volcanic rocks.

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Students create and modify a STELLA model of the global phosphorus cycle to test a number of scenarios.

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