Rock Explorers for Early Years

This activity, one of a number written for young children, is 'Rock Explorer; putting rocks into families'.

Through this activity, pupils are introduced, to how rocks can be investigated, discussed and used. A variety of cross-curricular and creative approaches can be carried out.
Other activities for young children can be found in Teaching strategies on our website.

Recipe for a magnetic Earth and a magnetic detector

Our new Earthlearningidea today is 'Recipe for a magnetic Earth and a magnetic detector: using a stress ball and small magnet, with a needle and thread to model magnetic Earth'

If you want to use the ‘Magnetic Earth’ Earthlearningidea in your teaching, but would like each group of pupils to try it out for themselves, then this version can be put together very cheaply. Other activities associated with Earth's magnetism can be found in the alphabetical index or by using the search engine.

Clues in sediment which bring an environment to life

'What was it like to be there? – clues in sediment which bring an environment to life: bringing a depositional environment to life using evidence from sedimentary structures.' 

This ELI asks ‘deep questions’ about sedimentary structures to help pupils to visualise the environment in which they formed.
Many more activities about sediment deposition and sedimentary structures can be found on our website, either by using the alphabetical index or the search engine. The former gives a list of such structures with an activity for each.

Hand modelling of compression, tension and shear in the Earth

Today's new Earthlearningidea is 'Modelling Earth stresses with your hands; hand modelling of compression, tension and shear in the Earth'.

This is a class activity to help pupils to visualise and remember the types of stress in the Earth through modelling with their hands. The results of the different types of stress are seen in the deformation of a cube, shown in the diagrams above.
Activities to demonstrate these stresses can be found on our website. The easiest way is to search for 'Stresses in the Earth' in the alphabetical index.