Modelling for Rocks - New Earthlearningidea

Our December activity 'Modelling for Rocks: What's hidden inside - and why?' has now been published on our website. This activity investigates the permeability of rocks and how they let water, oil and gas flow through. At the end of the activity, pupils will be able to test rock permeability and put rocks in order of permeability. They will be able to make 2D and 3D models to show different sorts of permeability or impermeability and be able to apply their knowledge to real world situations. They will understand that rocks which are good for holding oil, gas or water must be both porous and permeable. They will investigate their local rocks and assess their potential for extracting water, oil or gas, or for sealing water storage lakes and oil/gas traps.
Please try this activity with your pupils and let us have your comments and suggestions. Some photos of pupils carrying out some permeability tests would be most welcome.

Link for Earthlearningidea and 'One Laptop per Child'

Can anyone help us to link 'Earthlearningidea' and 'One Laptop per Child'? It would be wonderful if the children shown in this audio slideshow were accessing our Earth-related activities.
The laptops are currently being tested around the world. The pupils in the slideshow are from the LEA primary school, Galadima, on the outskirts of Abuja, Nigeria.

Tsunami through the window in Portugal

Many thanks to the pupils of the Father Francisco Soares School in Portugal who wrote about seeing a tsunami through the window. Their accounts are imaginative and vivid and show that the pupils understand the devastation, fear and panic caused by such a natural hazard. Click here to read them on the website.

The Earthlearningidea team is especially pleased as this sort of work is what we hoped would happen when we devised our project. The original activity may be downloaded from our website in English or Spanish.

Education for everyone, including girls

UNGEI, The United Nations Girls' Education Initiative is a project aimed specifically at education for girls. Of the world's illiterate adults, two-thirds are women. Of 100 million children worldwide between ages 6 and 11 who are not in school, 70% are girls.
Click here for more information about the project.

Please send us your photos of boys and girls learning from, and enjoying, Earthlearningideas.

Do you know about the Earth Science Education Unit in the UK?

The Earth Science Education Unit (ESEU) is based at Keele University, Staffordshire in the UK. It provides short, modular workshops which cover the Earth Science content needed by UK schools. These workshops are activity-based and stress the importance of enquiry in science. They address pedagogical issues as well as subject content. Because the Earthlearningidea team members are all involved with ESEU, ELI activities have a similar approach.

ESEU is funded by Oil and Gas UK and this means that a nationwide team of centrally-trained ESEU facilitators can deliver the workshops in schools, colleges and universities across the UK.

Click here to view the activities in ESEU's 'The Dynamic Rock Cycle'.