Carbon cycle caper

At the recent Annual Conference of the Association for Science Education, Science Museum staff encouraged grown men and women to race excitedly around the room, transferring coloured plastic balls from one container into another and back again! They were taking part in an elaborate activity called 'Carbon Cycle Caper', designed to show 12 year-olds how the carbon cycle works, by becoming physically and mentally involved for a period of some 70 minutes. The Science Museum website gives full details for teachers who might wish to organise the activity for up to 60 pupils at once in the school hall or playground. It took over a year to develop and some details had to be omitted (including the fact that the biggest store of carbon in the Earth and atmosphere is locked up in the rocks, in the form of limestones). Nevertheless, the activity provides a good stimulus for pupils to explore this most complex and important topic, and once organised for one cohort of pupils could then be more readily used in successive years.
You could also try our two carbon cycle Earthlearningidea activities:-
- Carbon goes round and round and round
- Carbon cycle through the window

Fluids, friction and failure

The first ELI for 2012 is 'Fluids, friction and failure; how can unseen fluids affect the movement along faults and glacier beds?' This is a simple test of the angle at which friction is overcome and a drinks can begins to slide down an inclined board. Using a drinks can with small holes at the bottom results in water seeping out on to the surface of the board which reduces the friction.
The ELI website has over 100 Earth-related practical activities - use the search engine or search for a topic or category to find an idea which will stimulate and motivate your pupils.

Earthlearningidea in 2011

Earthlearningidea has continued to grow in 2011. In March we published our 100th activity with "'Crystallisation' in a pudding dish" and in October the number of downloads of our activities passed half a million. Also in 2011, our activities started to be translated into Portuguese and German. We shall continue to publish a new activity every two weeks throughout 2012.
For this last post of the year, the Earthlearningidea team would like to thank all the people who have made these achievements possible.

Thank you!

Modelling energy transmission in seismic waves

'Merry waves - all year round; modelling how the energy of seismic waves is transmitted' is our latest new ELI. At the end of the activity pupils can:-
• describe how energy is transmitted in the form of waves;
• note that there is no macroscopic displacement of mass involved in the process;
• explain how P and S waves move though the Earth’s interior;
• explain how a tsunami wave propagates though a mass of water.
This is one on many Earthlearningideas about Earthquakes and earthquake waves.

Subduction of underwater mountains

Amazing new images from the depths of the Pacific Ocean reveal one of Earth's most violent processes: the destruction of massive underwater mountains. They expose how tectonic action is dragging giant volcanoes into the ocean trench. The volcanoes are strung across several thousand kilometres of ocean floor and are moving westward on the Pacific tectonic plate at up to 6cm per year.
The extraordinary scene was captured along the Tonga Trench during a research expedition last summer. The trench is a highly active fault line running north from New Zealand towards Tonga and Samoa.
The video clip featured here could be used with any of our Plate tectonics activities

How Science works - famous people

Did you know that we have published a number of ELI activities about famous people who have contributed much to science? These include:-
Charles Darwin - Darwin's 'big soil idea' and
Darwin's 'big coral atoll idea'
James Hutton - James Hutton - or 'Mr. Rock Cycle'?
Mary Anning - Mary Anning - Mother of Palaeontology
Alfred Wegener and J. Tuzo Wilson - Wegener's 'continental drift' meets Wilson's ' plate tectonics'
William Smith - William Smith - 'The Father of English Geology'
Concerning William Smith, did you know that version 2 of iGeology includes a reproduction of the William Smith 1815 map? There is a 'fade-in' slider that allows you to change the transparency so you can compare William Smith's map with the current BGS map.
There is also a brief biography of William Smith.

Use a banana to simulate geological structures

Our new ELI this week is 'Banana benders'. Rocks can be folded into many shapes and can be broken by faulting. These fold and fault structures can be seen in mountain ranges, cliffs and even in small hand specimens. Try using bananas to see how these structures may be formed. Ask the pupils to draw or photograph their results and then try to label the fold and fault structures using the diagrams provided.
This is one of many Earth energy/processes activities you can find on our website.