Earthworks
Earth System Science for Secondary Teachers

Rachel Hughes (Earthworks 1999 & 2002)
lpoollass@aol.com

Mining to Understanding - connecting to Earth Science through Social Science (Earthworks 2002)

Learning Objectives:

Participants will be able to:

• Identify rocks and mineral associations with local mines in the Tucson Basin.
• Describe possible processes for formation of a mineralized zone.
• Describe how the formation of mineralized zone and understanding of this can lead to insight of regional geology.

Where: Catalina Mountains, Arbasco Mine, Bisbee Mine, Southern Arizona

Who: K-5 teachers ~20.

What: Intermediate teachers addresses AZ history, including copper mining with their students. Many teachers are much more comfortable with Social Sciences than with Earth Science. The will address teacher understanding of Earth Science through Social Science.

Day One:

Visit to mines in the mountains. Observations of rock and minerals as well as identification of materials by mine. What rocks, minerals and features do you see here?

Day Two:

Track over to another mine. Mapping techniques introduced. What rocks, minerals and features do you see here?

Introduce that miners/prospectors used geologic hints to target attempts or searches. These hints can tell us something about the structure of the region.

Day Three:

Other geologic features addressed in the field.

Day Four and Five

In class experiences addressing physical geography.

Day Six:

New site - You pick a spot and tell its story.

When: Summer 2003

Potential Barriers: Forest fires limiting access.

Desert Ecology: Pygmies and Pools (Earthworks 1999)

Rationale: Students live in a rapidly developing area, lots of construction within a fragile ecosystem. The controversy that this situation gives rise to is very apparent to the students and that their high school has not been built because the endangered pygmy owl is on the construction site. Their reactions to the controversy portray their lack of understanding about the ecosystem they live in and ecology field research, sampling size, etc. This exercise addresses science as inquiry while educating them about the nature of ecosystems, soil chemistry and plant adaptation.

Who: This is a whole class project, all 8th grade science periods experiencing this. It will be performed mainly in the fourth quarter when they have already had a chemistry introduction and are in the process of learning basic plant anatomy and physiology.

Resources: I'm going to need soil sieves, soil testing kits, tape measures, quadrats.

Day 1-2: Student's intro to site & plants on site & students learn how to keep a plant notebook, what aspect and soil types are. General intro to plant adaptation.

Day 3: What surprised them about the site? What questions do they have? Intro idea of sampling (pygmy) and why we sample and how we are going to sample site and transects and quadrats.

Day 4: Go out and do transects of area as a class

Day 5: Discuss results, observations e.g. I see only desert broom on the outside of the plot. Are mistletoe only in paloverde? What questions do you think a scientist might ask about the site?