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If
you are using Discover our Earth in an educational environment, please tell
us about it.
Introduction
WHAT YOU'LL FIND
Welcome to the Teacher's Guide to Cornell University's Discover Our Earth
pages. The Discover Our Earth project provides a variety of resources designed
to help you and your students explore Earth processes by accessing primary
Earth science data. There are resources for teachers as well as for students.
The pages designed for instructors parallel those designed for students, and
include background information, curriculum guides, classroom activities, questions
for students, and answers. In addition, you have access to two interactive
modules that allow you to explore a variety of solid Earth data sets. These
modules, QUEST and GEOID, form the core of the project and give you and your
students a window through which you can examine and explore the Earth. We
have developed materials to cover five topics: topography, earthquakes, volcanoes,
plate tectonics, and sea level change.
High school and introductory-level college students will probably benefit most from the QUEST module. QUEST allows students to select and query data sets in order to make their own maps of geological and geophysical features. Students can examine spatial correlations and draw inferences about the nature of plate tectonics and other Earth processes in simple but powerful ways. With QUEST, students have the ability to assemble data just as scientists do, to formulate hypotheses, test them, and draw their own conclusions. More advanced students can probe the Earth in greater depth using the more advanced GEOID applet. If you are teaching upper level undergraduate and graduate courses, the advanced mapping tool might be more suitable for your needs. We encourage you to get to know both of the tools and utilize either or both, as appropriate.
ABOUT OUR APPROACH
This project was constructed with two fundamental assumptions. The first is
that students learn best by engaging in hands-on, minds-on activities. When
a student explores a topic and constructs his/her own understanding of the
subject, the student has a much deeper and more fundamental grasp of the processes
involved, and the material is retained much longer, then if he/she simply
reads a list of established priciples. Through the activities that we've designed
and the questions that accompany them, we are engaging students in guided
inquiry. We are asking students to explore primary Earth science data sets,
and to emulate the process that scientists engage in when conducting original
research. We hope that your students will develop concepts for themselves,
and perhaps even discover things that we didn't anticipate!
The second assumption built into the materials here is that one of the most powerful ways to explore the Earth is through the use of geospatial data. Examining the spatial relationships between various geologic and geophysical features is an approach that has long been employed by Earth scientists, and is an effective way to gain insight into the processes responsible for a variety of Earth processes. Wegener's theory of Continental Drift, published in 1912, was entirely based on geospatial relationships. When geoscientists in the 1960's gained access to new information, particularly from the sea floor, spatial relationships were again key in developing the new theory of Plate Tectonics. Nowadays, spatial data is most effective accessed through a Geographic Information System (GIS), which requires the use of specific GIS software and rather powerful computers. The data made available on our site is all GIS-based; however: you need nothing other than a basic web browser to take full advantage of these resources. By using our tools, you and your students can gain access to high-resolution geospatial data, allowing them to develop their own insights into Earth processes.
We invite your collaboration in our efforts. Please contact
us at QUEST@geology.cornell.edu with questions and/or comments!
> Introduction <
