Modelling mighty rivers and small-scale processes

The new ELI is 'Investigating small-scale sedimentary processes AND modelling mighty rivers' This activity uses the ‘Mighty River in a small gutter’ Earthlearningidea activity at different scales.

The ‘Mighty river in a small gutter’ can be used to investigate surface processes, caused by water currents, in the classroom at two different scales.
Pupils of all ages can learn a lot from this activity and have fun at the same time!
More investigations can be found on our website.

Rocks are in the rock cycle e-i-e-i-oooooooooo

For the holidays, the ELI Team present you with 'The Rock Cycle Song'. Please sing loudly to the tune of 'Old MacDonald had a Farm'

Lots of activities about the rock cycle can be found on our website.

Modelling river pothole-formation by calculation

The new ELI continues our maths in ELIs theme: 'A bucket for a pothole: visualising past processes by calculation; modelling river pothole-formation by calculation – thinking through the assumptions'.

River potholes like the ones shown in the photos above are thought to have been formed by abrading gravel moved by eddies in the water as it flows over the bedrock. This activity seeks to mimic this mode of formation in order to provoke calculation and discussion around the processes involved.
Many more activities to do with rivers and river erosion can be found on the website.

3 million downloads / ELI translations

3 million activity downloads! 

The ELI team is delighted to announce that by the end of March 2017, there have been 3 million activity downloads. We should like to thank all the volunteers involved in this project, especially all of our translators and, of course, all of our users. Hopefully lots of pupils have enjoyed trying out the ideas in Earth science or geography lessons.

To all Educators:
One of our German translators who teaches in a University of Education recommends that other educators follow his example and ask their university students to translate one Earthlearningidea and present it to the other students as part of their course. These translations are then checked and finally added to the website.

Japanese translations
Our Japanese colleagues have added 32 translations to the site; incredible. Many, many thanks.