Week 10 - The Rock Cycle

Week 10 - The Rock Cycle

Introduction

Discussing Assessments

We started off our lab section by discussing the issue of assessment. When we look at assessment, we have shifted from the standard "learn the material, take a test" to formative and summative assessment. We had to think about how we do assess our students? I believe that formative assessment is the better route to go because this allows for us as teachers to see what our students know. This helps us plan our lessons and also helps us find possible lines of student inquiry. When we also look at assessment, there are inherent dangers in using percentages. What if one student shows growth? Even if that student scores low but shows growth in their progress, is it fair that they still receive a lower score? Across time, grades have skewed higher, this is due to the habit from the Vietnam War era in order to avoid being drafted.

Convection Currents and Earth's Layers

We were asked to construct a video on convection currents. From research, we can easily model a convection current. 


What is happening? When something (like a liquid) is heated up, the hot substance will lose density and rises to the top. As the substance reaches the top and cools off, it becomes more dense and sinks to the bottom where it heats up again. This cyclic process defines the convection cell. How does this relate to plate tectonics? Underneath the Earth's surface (the crust) (which can be taught to students through the "egg model"), we have the mantle, then the inner core, then outer core. The convection process happens in the mantle, and this causes the plates to move.

Lab Investigation

For our lab this week, we worked on the rock cycle (igneous, metamorphic, sedimentary). Instead of rocks, we used Starburst candy and other tools around the lab (water, torches, hot plates) to create "rocks."
Some of the tools that we used

We created igneous rock:


Metamorphic rock:



Sedimentary Rock:


New Discoveries

In our discussion, we dived into the rock cycle and looked at how each type of rock is formed. We also learned about two separate concepts - weathering and erosion. Weathering "makes the mess" and rocks are attacked by the environment in a mechanical or a chemical process. Multiple chemical processes occur when we look at how weathering can occur. There are also several mechanical processes that do the same. 

We also learned about the Law of Superposition on the topic of sedimentary rocks. Simply put, older layers are towards the bottom, and newer layers are towards the top. Additionally, we have the Principle of Original Horizontality, which states that these layers are formed in a horizontal direction. Faults, dykes, earthquakes, etc. can cause these to shift.

Connections

We learned about convection currents, which has led to a connection to what we learned earlier about plate tectonics and continental drift. This is a factor that lead to the continental drift, as fossils from similar life forms have been found on different continents. A common misconception occurs when we think about how only erosion occurs in the rock cycle. This is not the case, as weathering plays a key concept as well. 

What's Next

For next week, we will discuss an article on teaching for conceptual change and we will also take a deeper look into sand.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week 1 - Making a Race Exciting

Image
Week 1 - Making a Race Exciting News/Introduction For our first week in our Physics unit, we are thinking about different things that children do while at the park. One such important thing we talked about is how the playground equipment has an important role in the overall design of the park. Some questions we developed as a class were: What makes the playground "fun?" What materials should we use when designing our playground? What other factors do we need to consider when we design a playground (safety, location, etc.)? How can we make this playground "fun?" During our discussion, we explored one thing that is commonly seen on the playground. Children love to race to places or things. As a result, our discussion led to us asking another key question: How can we make a race exciting? But what defines "exciting?" Our class came up with a big idea to make the race exciting. This race has to be close. You want to be on the edge of your seat for the...
Read more

Week 12 - Introduction to Climate Chage

Week 12 - Intro to Climate Change News/Introduction This will be a short intro because we had our geology quiz! But we started off by discussing the documentary  Before the Flood. We learned many things on climate change and how our actions have contributed to the rise in greenhouse gases (methane and carbon dioxide). One contributing factor has to do with the denial of climate change, despite evidence showing.  For our lab investigation, we looked at NASA's Images of Change, and were shocked at some of the images. During this time, we asked about questions that students would ask. But these images were shocking! During this time we also discussed the idea of climate versus weather and came up with an important distinction - weather is a daily measure, while climate is a measure based on the weather for the last 30 years.  The main part of our investigation was looking at the Iowa goldfinch. Is the goldfinch in danger? We looked at weather data at different regions of Iow...
Read more