In this introductory physics lab activity, students explore the sounds made by the free-end of a ruler vibrating off the end of a desk.

Think about the many sets of data you may encounter in your daily activities. You may track your finances, follow statistics for your favorite sport, watch stock market trends, or pay attention to weather records such as temperature and precipitation. News reports often include graphs that you must understand in order to follow an argument. And of course, scientists use graphs to summarize and convey information and to support hypotheses. Before the days of computers, people had to record data and perform calculations by hand. In fact, the original use of the word "computer" was to describe a person whose job was doing arithmetic. At that time, a spreadsheet was a piece of paper with ruled lines forming rows and columns where data could be written in. Today, most people use computer spreadsheets in the form of software such as Microsoft Excel -- , but the basic idea remains the same.
Student materials for this exercise include a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet with marked cells and several charts and the instruction sheet (MS Word). The exercise is divided into three parts.
Part I introduces the capability of a spreadsheet to handle a large dataset containing worldwide earthquake epicenters from October 2011 and plots a scatter chart of these data, which is equivalent to a map.
In Part II, students work with several different types of charts (column, bar, pie, and triangle charts) and use tables and charts to answer questions about Earth's interior.
Part III involves entering a formula using cell names, learning to fill down, and discovering how relative and absolute cell names work. This work is done in the context of Earth's interior layers.

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A lesson on states of matter using marbles for molecules expands into 3 more lessons elaborating on properties of a gas.

An introduction to processes associated with continental rifting, and resulting fault geometries and distributions, and lithospheric responses, using seismic data examples from the Gulf of California.

This activity is a field investigation where students make observations of the pebble beach, lava flows, and wetland restoration at Sugarloaf Cove to generate questions to be addressed throughout the earth science curriculum.

Using a map showing the horizontal velocities of GPS stations in the Plate Boundary Observatory and other GPS networks in Alaska and Western United States, students are able to describe the motions in different regions by interpreting the vectors resulting from long-term high-precision Global Positioning System (GPS) data.
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NGSS ALIGNMENT
Disciplinary Core Ideas
History of Earth: HS-ESS1-5
Earth' Systems: MS-ESS2-2
Earth and Human Activity: MS-ESS3-2, HS-ESS3-1
Science and Engineering Practices
4. Analyzing and Interpreting Data
5. Using Mathematics and Computational Thinking
6. Constructing Explanations and Designing Solutions
Crosscutting Concepts
4. Systems and System Models
7. Stability and Change

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The goal of this laboratory is to help students understand that burning fossil fuels, which results in an increase in the acidity of ocean waters, has a detrimental impact on marine life (specifically coral but also other organisms that have calcium carbonate based shells).

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This is a two-part activity that implements an extension of the "think-pair-share" cooperative learning technique to study the determinants of supply and demand through hypothetical and real world examples.

Google Earth enhances traditional geologic maps by allowing the viewer to explore three-dimensional map patterns and the interaction between structure and topography in dictating those map patterns. This activity overlays 4, 7.5' USGS quadrangles on Google Earth terrain and imagery data and encourages students to investigate common features of fold-and-thrust belts.

Keywords: Google Earth, fold-and-thrust belt, visualization

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This laboratory exercise explores the topographic signature of fluvial and glacial landscapes in different tectonic environments. Students develop a list of mountain ranges around the world to explore, then extract topographic data from 90-meter SRTM DEMs, and develop a series of hypsometric curves for each range. Each student works on a single range, but as a class we build up a database of 10-15 ranges around the world. The hypsometric curves are compared with each other and with published curves to look for signals of fluvial incision vs. glacial erosion in the landscapes.

1. Day 1: End of class Mini lecture (15 minutes) on:
a. what greenstone belts are (where in the world, rock assemblages, structures)
b. vertical vs. horizontal tectonic models (old arguments and current details).
c. Superior Province (one example) introduction

2. Homework and Jigsaw Activity: Looking at "typical" structures within greenstone belts.
This assignment asks students to compare papers with folding models vs. thrusting models. One set of papers that provides a good contrast focuses on the Beardmore-Geraldton greenstone belt in the Superior Province, Canada. Students will also use a paper with Lithoprobe seismic data across the Superior Province.

a. Folding model: Kehlenbeck, M. M. 1986. Folds and folding in the Beardmore-Geraldton fold belt. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences (CJES) 23, 158-171.
b. Thrusting model: Devaney, J. R. & Williams, H. R. 1989. Evolution of an Archean subprovince boundary: a sedimentological and structural study of part of the Wabigoon-Quetico boundary in northern Ontario. CJES 26 1013-1026.
c. Percival, J. A. et al. 2006. Tectonic evolution of the western Superior Province from NATMAP and Lithoprobe studies. CJES 43(7): 1085-1117.

Divide the class into 3 "expert" groups and assign one paper to each group. Students need to create an outline of the major structures (faults, folds, both) described and the evidence provided for the structural interpretation. Students should bring two copies of their outline to class.

3. Day 2
Turn in one copy of outline (to be assessed for grade) and meet with the group to create a composite, master outline (30 minutes). Students break up into small groups (one from each "expert" group), discover very different structural style interpretations, and try to determine WHY there are the discrepancies (lack of data, preconceived notions influencing interpretations, etc). The goal of the new group is to prepare each student to write a short paper. Each student is assigned to write a 1-page paper exploring reasons why there are discrepancies between the models. Students are also encouraged to speculate on what other evidence or future research might help resolve the apparent conflict. Students begin paper in class and finish outside of class.

4. Day 3
Students hand in paper (to be graded). Mini lecture/ discussion on key related questions.
a. Does either model (folding or faulting) support or negate either vertical or horizontal tectonic models?
b. Are there any modern analogues to greenstone belts? If so, what are the differences or limitations to the comparisons (lithological and structural)?

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This is a teacher demonstration used to show an example of kinetic molecular energy using food coloring and water. The students are also given opportunity to develop their own questions and tests.

In this exercise, students use both polyhedral model kits designed by the University of Wisconsin at Madison Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC) Institute for Chemical Education and computer visualization in Jmol to explore the structures of a variety of phyllosilicate minerals, and relate those structures to physical properties. Students work in small groups to build either a sequence of dioctahedral or trioctahedral minerals and answer a series of questions about structure, arrangement, coordination and bonding. The small dioctahedral and trioctahedral groups combine to compare structures and discuss additional questions about these and other minerals.

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This is a short activity that uses Google Earth to explore sea-level change as measured by tidal gauges around the world

During this module students use multiple experiences (reading, video,
the outdoors, a survey of their water footprints, writing, and lots of
discussion) to examine how life today, in comparison to pre-industrial
times, makes our connections to water virtually invisible. Students use
the class's water footprint results to find out how agricultural and
industrial water uses link us to people distant in both place and time.
They weigh the consequences of these invisible connections in creating
the lost sense of dependence and responsibility that typifies
unsustainability. Students study the variability of water footprints
within our class to help identify more sustainable personal choices.
They consider the activity of a local watershed association to educate
and involve people in improving the quality of local streams as a model
of how community action can accomplish what individuals cannot.

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This assignment requires students to visit a local geologic feature. Students choose a field site, visit it and observe features such as weathering, rock type, folding, or faulting. At their field site, they are encouraged to make sketches and take photographs. They will turn in a description of the site, geologic origin, and geomorphologic evolution. This assignment is especially useful for non-majors who may not normally be interested in outdoor activities.

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This activity provides for small group investigation of the properties of different liquids leading to the discovery that liquids are different in many ways, including density.Students would be led to a very beginning understanding of density.

This is a collaborative learning activity based on the documentaries "King Corn" and "Big River" in which students explore and propose solutions to sustainability issues associated with industrial agriculture and food systems.

This exercise is designed to give the students a hands-on experience in which they can relate different orientations of an indicatrix to the different birefringence observed for each orientation. Each student is given a piece of fruit that has the shape of a uniaxial indicatrix - either a kiwi (uniaxial positive) or a tangerine (uniaxial negative). The student follows a set of instructions to insert toothpicks to represent the different indicatrix axes and to draw on the fruit using a permanent marker the circular and principal sections. Then the student is asked a series of questions asking them to determine the birefringence of the mineral for different orientations of the fruit.

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