Earth Materials in Our Lives Earth ScienceEarth Activity Materials Calendar, 2020-2021 in OurSchool YearLives

EARTH SCIENCE WEEK www.earthsciweek.org

Earth Science Week 2020 • American Geosciences Institute • www.americangeosciences.org Geoscience All Around here can you find Earth materials? In every part of your life. Raw materials are essential to Wfood, clothing, medicine, buildings, employment, manufacturing, industry, transportation, energy, recycling, and more.

That’s why Earth Science Week 2020 focuses on the theme “Earth Materials in Our Lives,” raising awareness of the many ways that raw materials impact humans — and the ways human activity impacts these materials — in the 21st century. The celebration engages young people and others in exploring this theme through learning resources and activities.

Help promote understanding of humans’ complex interactions with the Earth materials of our geosphere (earth), hydrosphere (water), atmosphere (air), and biosphere (living things). Visit the Earth Science Week website (www.earthsciweek.org). Check out new links to educational materials and information. Engage young people and others in the vital role they can play in Earth science.

And keep learning about the geosciences throughout the school year. Use this calendar, which features education resources, important geoscience dates, and exciting academic activities. Connect with geoscience learning all year long!

Images ©iStockphoto.com ©Shutterstock.com. This page, clockwise from bottom Geoff Camphire left: ©Shutterstock/ChrisMilesPhoto; ©Shutterstock/Andresr; ©Shutterstock/Creativa; ©Shutterstock/MonkeyBusinessImages; ©iStock/manonallard; ©iStock/SerrNovik. Cover: Associate Director, Communications center: ©iStock/vgajic. Side images clockwise from top right: ©Shutterstock/kawinnings; ©iStock/lrescigno; ©iStock/kozmoat98; ©Shutterstock/Darwel; ©iStock/Alexey Rezvykh; American Geosciences Institute ©iStock/GaryKavanagh; ©iStock/sergeyryzhov; ©iStock/Helga Miller. Earth Science Week Is for You

his year, you’re invited to join the tens of millions of participants in all 50 states T and nations worldwide who are celebrating Earth Science Week. Now in its 23rd year, this exciting event has grown steadily in momentum and participation since the American Geosciences Institute held the first Earth Science Week in 1998.

Every year, people in schools, workplaces, Whether you are a faculty member, student, www.earthsciweek.org civic centers, and elsewhere celebrate parent, geoscientist, or ordinary citizen, you can Earth Science Week to help build public play a leading role in Earth Science Week. On How can you get involved? Explore understanding and appreciation of the Earth the event’s website at www.earthsciweek.org, the Earth Science Week website at sciences, promote recognition of the value you’ll find ideas and tips for planning activities www.earthsciweek.org. You’ll find of Earth science research, and encourage at your school or workplace, along with a host of tools designed to make stewardship of the planet. Earth Science contact information for geoscience resources your event experience easy, fun, Week serves the geoscience community by: in your area where you can work with local and rewarding! geoscientists to plan activities. • giving students new opportunities to On the website, you’ll see a list of tips discover the Earth sciences, In addition, this calendar features a variety of to help you share your Earth science • highlighting the contributions made by exciting activities that you can conduct — in knowledge with young people, lead the geosciences to society, the schoolyard, at home, or elsewhere in the an excursion, or attend an event in community — to explore the theme “Earth your area: A planning checklist, tips • publicizing the message that Earth Materials in Our Lives.” This year’s theme for fundraising, recommendations for science is all around us, focuses on the many ways that raw materials working with the news media, ideas impact humans, and vice versa, today. for events, educational activities, • encouraging responsible stewardship of ways to get official recognition, the planet through an understanding of Let us know how you are planning downloadable logos and images, Earth processes, to celebrate! Send us an email at kit ordering information, a map of [email protected]. Celebrate Earth potential partners and activities near • providing a forum where geoscientists can Science Week: October 11–17, 2020! you, and much more. share their knowledge and enthusiasm about the Earth and how it works, and To stay up-to-date on the latest CHECK THE DATE developments and upcoming • making learning about Earth science fun! Please independently confirm the dates of activities, subscribe to the Earth any geoscience events in which you plan to Science Week Update electronic participate. Due to the COVID-19, some events Top to bottom: Artwork by 2019 ESW Contest finalist Ares Bandebo- newsletter at www.earthsciweek.org. Cambra; Winning photo in the 2019 ESW Contest by Tonya Boone.; scheduled before the printing of this calendar Participants in the 2019 USGS Take Your Kids to Work Day, credit: Check it out! AGI, background by NPS; Participants in the 2019 National Fossil may have been rescheduled or reformatted as Day at the Grand Canyon, credit: AGI, background by NPS. “virtual meetings” since that time. August 2020

LEARNING ACTIVITY: Nature’s Water Filter

GRADES 6-8 oil is a filter that helps maintain a clean over the gravel/floatie mixture. Observe. purple, so the blue dye was pulled out environment and safe drinking water. Discuss: by the soil. Why? MATERIALS S • Did the floaties end up in the bottom 6 Opposite charges attract and like charges • 4 3-oz clear solo cups When rain falls on a soil surface, or when cup? Why, or why not? repel. The smallest soil particles are clay, • 4 5-oz clear solo cups (with contaminated water is introduced to a soil • What is this type of filtration? which have a negative charge. If the red 3–5 small holes in the surface, it infiltrates into the soil. As water 2 Ready to explore chemical filtration? dye goes through the soil, it must also bottom of each cup) moves downward, the soil acts as a natural Create three more cups — one with fine have a negative charge; the blue dye has a • 4 funnels water filter, removing harmful contaminants sand, one with topsoil, and one with positive charge which attracts and binds it • Play sand and delivering clean water to rivers, lakes, and potting soil or crushed peat moss. to the clay (sorption). Discuss: • Topsoil underground water reservoirs called aquifers. 3 Mix 0.5 g grape drink powder into 1 liter • As more of the drink mix is poured • Planting mix or peat moss of water. through the soil, does the water in the • Fine gravel Two types of filtration occur during this 4 Slowly pour 50 ml grape drink into each of bottom cup get progressively more • Grape drink mix packet, e.g., process — physical and chemical. Physical the four cups. For each cup, observe and purple? Why? The clay in the soil has Kool-Aid® filtration happens when large particles are record what happens: reached its capacity to capture the • “Floaties” such as leaves, tea physically prevented from traveling through • What color is the grape drink that goes positively charged blue ions. leaves, or grass clippings small soil pores and are therefore removed into each cup? • Did the water in the sand change color? • Water from water. Chemical filtration happens when • What color is the water that collects in Why or why not? Likely, it stayed purple, • Pen and paper for recording contaminants dissolved in water are attracted each of the bottom cups? which means that there is not any clay and held to the soil itself. This process is • Is the color of the water the same in the in it to attract the blue dye. What about called sorption. three cups? the gravel? • How much time does it take for water to This activity demonstrates how soil acts as a drain out of the top cup? Supplemental materials, videos, physical and chemical filter for contaminants. 5 Set aside the bottom cups (keep the water and worksheets are available in them). Pour the grape drink mix into at www.soils4teachers.org/esw. PROCEDURE the gravel a second time and collect the For the teacher: Before doing this activity, water in a new cup. Repeat the process visit www.soils4teachers.org/esw and review three times for the sand and six times for NGSS CONNECTIONS the set-up video. To set the stage for the the soil, and collect the water in new cups • Science and Engineering Practices — following activity, play the “Soils Clean and each time. Observe and record: Analyzing and Interpreting Data Capture Water” video for students. • Is the color different for the gravel cup • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Earth Materials Source: Soil Science Society of 1 Ready to explore physical filtration? Fill a on the second try? and Systems America. Adapted with permission. 5-oz cup half-full of gravel. Add “floaties” • What about for the sand and topsoil? • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Credit for the lesson plan, activity, and video to the top. Put the cup over the funnel. • Has the water in one of the cups turned Cause and Effect: Mechanism belongs to Drs. Clay Robinson, Michelle Blumer, and SSSA. Slowly pour about 100 ml (3 oz) water red? Why? Blue and red dyes make and Explanation Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1

Happy Birthday!  Henry Darwin Rogers, American Structural Geologist, Contributed to the Theory of Mountain Building, Born 1808 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Happy Birthday!  Johann Gottlob Lehmann, Did You Know?  German Geologist Noted Happy Birthday!  U.S. Space Shuttle Endeavour for Fundamental Work in Neil Armstrong, American Astronaut Barbara Morgan the Stratigraphy, Published the First Astronaut, the First Man to Walk First Educator to Safely Reach Friendship Day Geologic Profile, Born 1719 on the Moon, Born 1930 Space, 2007 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Did You Know?  The First Three Fossil Bones of Happy Birthday!  “SUE” Tyrannosaurus rex Skeleton Edward W. Gifford, American Discovered by Sue Hendrickson, Self-Taught Anthropologist and 1990 Archaeologist, Born 1887 16 17 18 19 20 21 22

Did You Know?  Did You Know?  Hurricane Camille (Category 5) Florissant Fossil Beds National Strikes Mississippi, Louisiana Monument, Renowned for Insect and Virginia, 1969 Fossils, Authorized 1969

23 24 Did You Know?  25 26 27 28 29 Hurricane Andrew (Category 5) Hits Florida and Louisiana, 1992

Did You Know? U.S. Challenger Astronaut Guion Did You Know?  Did You Know?  Bluford Becomes First Hurricane Katrina (Category 5) Colonel Edwin Drake Drills Black Astronaut Strikes Florida, Later Louisiana, First U.S. Oil Well in Titusville, in Space, 1983 30 31 2005 Pennsylvania, 1859

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org August 2020 September 2020 Celebrate Minerals Day Next Month Visit the Minerals Day website at www.earthsciweek.org/ LEARNING ACTIVITY: minerals-day to learn how you can tap educational resources to celebrate the first-ever Minerals Day during Earth Science Week Change Over Time in October 2020!

GRADES 4-12 rom very early times, humans have used Earth materials around PROCEDURE them to make the objects they needed. These objects included 1 Look around your home and make a list of common objects MATERIALS Ftools, weapons, figurines, vessels, ornaments and many others. that are likely to have been around 70 or 80 years ago. (Think • Paper and pen for recording Resources for materials are either mined (minerals) or grown. about food containers and packaging, toys, tools, utensils, lights, • Computer or cell phone with communication devices, etc.) internet connection In fact, these materials played such an important role in humans’ lives • Pictures of objects from that early archaeological periods were named for them. First there was 2 Ask an older person you know if he or she would be willing to talk different eras the Stone Age, followed by the Bronze Age, then the Iron Age. The with you about how materials and objects have changed over discovery of fire enabled humans to combine metals to make stronger time. You may be able to do this in person, on the telephone, in and more shapeable materials. As people discovered more about writing, or through an internet connection. the properties of metals and other materials, they were able to make objects that were more sophisticated and more versatile. 3 Ask your interviewee about the decades in which he or she grew up. Record when this time was. Then ask the interviewee about the These discoveries have continued in modern times. The materials materials that household objects are made from, both now and used to make objects in the 1940s and 1950s are, in many cases, very in the past. What were the advantages in the older materials? The different from the materials used today to make the same objects. disadvantages? How do these materials compare with what is used With a little research, you can find out how objects and their materials to make the same objects now? Record this information. have changed over time. 4 Make a table showing how the materials have changed over your interviewee’s lifetime. Use the internet to research both the old and the new materials. Include this information in your table as well.

5 Review your findings. What new discoveries in materials have changed the way objects are made? How do the advantages and disadvantages of each type of material compare? What happens to the materials used to make the objects when the object is thrown away?

NGSS CONNECTIONS The design of and materials used for many common objects have changed • Science and Engineering Practices — Obtaining, Evaluating, and Source: Adapted with permission by over time. Communicating Information the Mineralogical Society of America Image credits: All Wikimedia Commons. Left • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Earth’s Materials and Systems from AGI’s Investigating Earth to right: Wilson Wong; Tomasz Sienicki; FEMA/ Systems. Bill Koplitz • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Structure and Function Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3 4 5

Protect Your Groundwater Day Sept. 4–7, 2020: Did You Know?  Geoscience Event:  Unnamed Hurricane 39th NABG Annual Technical (Category 5) Conference, National Association Batters Florida Keys, 1935 of Black Geoscientists 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Happy Birthday! Stephen Jay Gould, U.S. Paleontologist and Evolutionary Biologist, Labor Day Born 1941 Patriot Day 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

World Water Monitoring Day Rosh Hashanah Begins Sept. 15–20, 2020: (Sundown) Geoscience Event:  63rd AEG Annual Meeting, Sept. 18–27, 2020: Did You Know?  Association of Environmental International Day for the Citizenship Day Geoscience Event:  Hurricane Ike (Category 4) & Engineering Geologists, Preservation of the Flagstaff Festival of Science, Strikes Texas, 2008 Portland, Oregon Ozone Layer Constitution Day Flagstaff, Arizona 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

Autumnal Equinox Did You Know?  Did You Know?  Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park, Hurricane Rita (Category 5) Containing World’s Most Active Batters Texas and Louisiana, Rosh Hashanah Ends Volcano, Established 1961 2005 National Public Lands Day 27 28 29 30

Yom Kippur ends Sept. 28– Oct. 1, 2020: Geoscience Event:  AAPG International Conference and Exhibition, American Yom Kippur begins Association of Petroleum (sundown) Geologists, Madrid, Spain

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org September 2020 October 2020

LEARNING ACTIVITY: Minerals Under Your Roof

GRADES 3-8 id you know that many of the supplies You Found a Pencil! in your classroom are made from Earth MATERIALS Dmaterials that are mined from solid A pencil contains three types of Earth • Computer with Earth? What can you find that you think may have materials: graphite, clay, and aluminum. internet access been mined? Graphite-bearing schist. Graphite: A “core” of the mineral graphite Mark Carter/USGS This activity can be done in small teams as a contest makes up the writing material of a pencil or with the whole class, depending on grade level. and is surrounded by a tube of wood that In this activity, you will make a pile of items you can be sharpened into a point. Graphite is I’M MADE FROM think may have come from the solid Earth. You can a very soft mineral that rubs off easily onto EARTH MATERIALS! then use U.S. Geological Survey resources to trace paper and is the crystalline form of carbon. #classroomscavengerhunt the items back to their source within the Earth and It occurs naturally in metamorphic rocks #madefromearthmaterials understand how they are formed. such as marble, schist, and gneiss.

PROCEDURE Clays: Clay minerals (such as bentonite A microscopic image of dickite 1 Briefly discuss mining. How do people extract or kaolin) are used in pencils to help the clay particles. Pencil Earth materials from the solid Earth? What graphite stick together. Clay minerals are Howard May/USGS Contains Earth Materials: products are made from mined materials? composed of thin sheets of Al, Si, and O and graphite, clay, aluminum form in the presence of water. Sources: graphite 2 Look around the classroom. Make a pile of (metamorphic rocks), clay (sediments and sedimentary objects you think might be made from mined Aluminum Ore (Bauxite): A small piece rocks), aluminum (aluminum materials. For objects unsafe to lift, print out and (ferrule) of aluminum metal is used at the

ore aka bauxite, Al2O3) affix copies of the “I’m made from” label at left. end of a pencil to secure the eraser. Bauxite #madefromearthmaterials is a heterogeneous (mixed) material made @USGS_YES 3 Visit www.usgs.gov/scavengerhunt online up of aluminum hydroxide minerals, plus for an answer key and to learn more about the various types of silica, iron oxides, titanium, Aluminum ore, also known as bauxite. mined materials that go into many classroom aluminosilicate, and other impurities. Scott Horvath/USGS objects. Consider, for example, an ordinary pencil. Explore each material’s pathway from Earth to final product through a group discussion, team NGSS CONNECTIONS presentations, or with labeled artwork. • Science and Engineering Practices — Constructing Explanations and Designing Solutions Source: U.S. Geological Survey. Learn additional information at www.usgs.gov/ • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Natural Resources Adapted with permission. scavengerhunt. • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Cause and Effect Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3

Oct. 3–6, 2020: Geoscience Event:  AIPG National Conference, American Institute of Professional Geologists, Sacramento, California 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Oct. 5–7, 2020: Geoscience Event:  Happy Birthday!  SPE Annual Technical Conference Nevil Maskelyne, English and Exhibition, Society of Astronomer Noted for His Oct. 4–10, 2020: Petroleum Engineers, Denver, Contribution to the Science of World Space Week Colorado Navigation, Born 1732 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 Geoscience for Everyone Day Great ShakeOut earthquake drill International EarthCache Day 10:15 a.m. CST Learn more at ShakeOut.org Oct. 11–16, 2020: International Archaeology Day Geoscience Event: Oct. 15–17, 2020: Geoscience Event: SEG International Exhibition and AISES National Conference, Did You Know?  90th Annual Meeting, Society Minerals Day Earth Observation Day American Indian Science and San Francisco’s 1989 Earthquake of Exploration Geophysicists, Engineering Society, Spokane, (Estimated Magnitude 6.9) Rocks EarthHouston, Texas Columbus Day NoScience Child Left Inside Day National Fossil Day Washington WeekGeologic Map Day Northern California, 1989 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

Oct. 18–21, 2020: Oct. 22–24, 2020: Geoscience Event:  Geoscience Event:  GRC Annual Meeting & Expo, SACNAS National Diversity in Geothermal Resources Council, STEM Conference, Society for Did You Know?  Reno, Nevada Advancement of Chicanos/ Fossil Butte National Hispanics and Native Americans Monument, Containing Nearly Oct. 18–24, 2020: in Science, Perfectly Preserved Fossils, National Chemistry Week Long Beach, California Established 1972 25 26 27 28 29 30 31

Oct. 25–28, 2020: Oct. 29–31, 2020: Geoscience Event:  Geoscience Event:  GSA Annual Conference, NSTA Area Conference, National Geological Society of America, Science Teachers Association, Montréal, Québec, Canada Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Halloween

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org October 2020 November 2020

LEARNING ACTIVITY: Steam-powered locomotives burn coal to provide energy. Carbon Travels Unsplash.com/Giuseppe Ruco

GRADES 5-12 e find carbon everywhere on Earth — in trees, rocks, fossil fuels, MATERIALS Woceans, and even you! Carbon • Poster materials doesn’t stay in one place, though. Scientists • Group student’s ideas into the major • Class set of dice study how carbon moves from one place to global carbon pools. • Station instructions another. This is the carbon cycle. and signs 2 Groups of students should prepare a • Carbon journey table The Industrial Revolution, starting in poster about one of the major global • Full teacher’s guide and the 1700s, saw a move to large-scale carbon pools (e.g. atmosphere, soil), worksheets at manufacturing and the use of new using information from the Carbon Cycle http://globecarboncycle. technologies, such as steam power and Adventure Story or other age-appropriate unh.edu/cmap2.shtml electricity. This led to a huge increase in resources. 5 Each student adds the path of his/her burning of carbon-rich fossil fuels, releasing journey on the board: one diagram for into the atmosphere carbon (in the form 3 Hand out copies of the Journey Table pre-1700, and one for post-1700. of carbon dioxide) that had been buried and a die to each student and tell them • Each time a student moved from one underground for millions of years. How did the game will begin pre-1700 (before the pool to another, they should draw these human actions affect the carbon cycle? Industrial Revolution). Model what to do an arrow. If they remained in a pool at a station and how to use the Journey until the next turn, they should circle PROCEDURE Table, emphasizing the importance of the pool. (For Teacher) including all results, even if they remain at • Students begin to work independently the same pool repeatedly. on completing “What’s Your Carbon 1 Tell students that you want to begin Story” until all students’ data are teaching about carbon today, but you 4 Divide students so there is an equal displayed on the board. cannot seem to find it. Ask students if number of students (if possible) at each • Consider students’ data. What was anyone saw carbon today on their way station to begin the activity. different before and after 1700? What into class. • Students follow the instructions, move do the differences reflect? Burning of • Record the ideas of where carbon is around the room at their own pace fossil fuels and land use change? found on the board. and record results in their tables. After • Solicit additional ideas about the carbon 10 turns, they stand aside to show they NGSS CONNECTIONS cycle. What is carbon? Where is it found? are done. • Science and Engineering Practices — How does carbon move from one place • Flip over the instructions to begin Developing and Using Models to another? What forms does it take? the post-1700 simulation. Students • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Earth’s Systems Source: NASA. Adapted • Differentially highlight/circle the pools complete another 10 turns under the • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Energy with permission. and fluxes. new conditions. and Matter Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Happy Birthday!  Léon-Philippe Teisserenc de Bort, French Meteorologist, Pioneer in Daylight Saving Time Ends the Field of Aerology, Co-discoverer of the Stratosphere, Born 1855 Happy Birthday!  Alfred Wegener, German Did You Know?  Meteorologist, Framer of Marie Curie’s Inaugural Lecture as Happy Birthday!  Continental Drift Theory, the First Woman Lecturer at the Marie Curie, Polish Geochemist Born 1880 Sorbonne, 1906 and Physicist, Born 1867 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Nov. 8–11, 2020: Geoscience Event:  Happy Birthday!  ASA-CSSA-SSSA International Charles Lyell, Scottish Geologist, Annual Meeting, Phoenix, “Principles of Geology” Author, Arizona Veterans Day Born 1797 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 Happy Birthday!  James W. Mitchell, American Chemist Advanced the Accuracy of Trace Element Analyses, Born 1943 GIS Day (Geographic Information Systems) Day Nov. 16–20, 2020: Nov. 19–21, 2020: Geoscience Event:  Happy Birthday!  Geoscience Event:  EU Raw Materials Week, Alan Shepard, American NSTA Area Conference, National Nov. 15–21, 2020: European Commission, Astronaut, First American in Science Teachers Association, Geography Awareness Week Brussels, Belgium Space, Born 1923 New Orleans, Louisiana 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

Happy Birthday!  Guion “Guy” S. Bluford, Jr, American Astronaut, First Black Astronaut in Space, Born 1942 Thanksgiving 29 30

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org November 2020 December 2020

LEARNING ACTIVITY: Soil, Sand, and Gravel

GRADES 5-12 arious types of sediments — what geoscientists call “surficial features” — lie above the Water interacts differently with various types of bedrock in many places. The U.S. Geological Survey provides a map illustrating this sediments. MATERIALS Vphenomenon at https://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2003/of03-275/. ©Shutterstock/Tuzemka For each student group: • Computer with “Most daily human activities occur on or near 2 Discuss: What are areas with similar 6 Consider the sediment cups as models of internet connection the Earth’s surface,” as the introduction to the surficial features? Where are there surficial surficial features. How might the different • Three clear plastic cups map states. “Homeowners, communities, and features that seem to be related to surficial features affect the amount of • Enough of each type of governments can make improved decisions features such as coastlines, mountains, water (hydrosphere) available to plants sediment material — soil, about hazard, resource, and environmental or rivers? How might we model the (biosphere)? (In general, when water sand, and gravel — to fill a issues, when they understand the nature of interaction of rain, streams, and oceans seeps into the sediments, it is available plastic cup roughly halfway surficial materials and how they vary from with various sediments? to plants.) • Small container of water place to place.” (about a half-gallon) 3 Within your group, fill three clear plastic 7 Now, return to the U.S. Geological Survey • Measuring cup Using this map can help students see the cups equally, about halfway, with a map online. What surficial features do you • Pen and paper connections between those surficial features, different type of sediment (soil, sand, and see in your part of the country, near major which are generally part of the geosphere, gravel). Describe the sediments in the rivers, and along coastlines? Why do you and other Earth systems. The following cups. How are they different? think these patters occur? activity shows how a visualization map of surficial features can be used to consider the 4 Fill a measuring cup with water. With a pen EXTENSION interactions of the geosphere, hydrosphere, and paper, record the amount of water in For an activity relating to surficial features biosphere, and atmosphere. the measuring cup. Pour some into one of that you can do in the school yard, go the clear plastic cups, adding water until to GLOBE at https://www.globe.gov/ PROCEDURE it is just above the level of the sediment. documents/352961/41672784-81d0-4189- 1 View the map and legend at https://pubs. Record the amount of water now in the 81f4-280acaa3364d. usgs.gov/of/2003/of03-275/. Notice that measuring cup. Calculate the amount different colors represent different types of water poured over sediment in the of surficial features (sediments). The map clear plastic cup. Repeat this process for NGSS CONNECTIONS colors indicate types of sediments that each sediment. • Science and Engineering Practices — differ in size, material, textures, amount Engaging in Argument from Evidence of organic material, and so on. The 5 Discuss: For which type of sediment does • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Earth Materials map legend tells about various surficial the most water go into the cup? (Typically, and Systems feature materials. larger sediments allow more water in.) • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Cause and Source: America Geophysical Union. How can water go into the sediments? (It Effect: Mechanism and Explanation Adapted with permission. seeps into spaces between particles.) Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3 4 5

Happy Birthday!  Clyde Wahrhaftig, American Geologist, Environmentalist, and Did You Know?  Recipient of GSA’s Kirk Bryan Aniakchak National Monument, Award for Geomorphology, One of World’s Finest Examples of Born 1919 Dry Caldera, Established 1980 World Soil Day 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Hanukkah Begins Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day (Sundown) Dec. 7–11, 2020: Dec.10–12, 2020: Geoscience Event:  Geoscience Event:  AGU Fall Meeting, American NSTA Area Conference, National Geophysical Union, Science Teachers Association, San Francisco, California Phoenix, Arizona International Mountain Day 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

Did You Know?  Happy Birthday!  First of Three Earthquakes in Allan Cox, American New Madrid, Missouri (Estimated Geophysicist, Paleomagnetism Magnitude 8.0), Causes Specialist, and Author of Two Mississippi River to Change Books on Plate Tectonics, Course, 1811 Born 1926 Hanukkah Ends 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

Dec. 26, 2020–Jan. 1, 2021: Kwanzaa Did You Know?  Did You Know?  Albert Michelson Receives the Did You Know?  Did You Know?  Earthquake Off West Coast Nobel Prize in Physics, Becoming Pierre-Jules-César Janssen Flew American Astronauts on Apollo 8 of Northern Sumatra the First American to Win the in a Balloon in Order to Study a Become the First People to Orbit (Magnitude 9.0), Sets Off Massive Nobel Prize in a Science, 1907 Winter Solstice Solar Eclipse, 1870 the Moon, 1968 Christmas Tsunami, 2004 27 28 29 30 31

New Year’s Eve

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org December 2020 January 2021 Aluminum BismuthCopper Sulfur LEARNING ACTIVITY: Pencils Incandescent Light Bulbs Mineral Matching

Attribution: Unknown Author, CC BY 3.0 Attribution: Johnathan Zander, CC BY-SA 2.5

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GRADES 6-12 he comfort of our daily lives is PROCEDURE Aluminum BismuthCopper Sulfur Uses: Mixed with other metals to create alloys, which are used in Uses: currency, electronics, building construction (pipes & wires), Uses: fireworks, matches, fertilizers; used in petroleum refining and Uses: packaging (e.g., cans, aluminum foil), automobiles, medicines for upset stomach (e.g., Pepto-Bismol), paints, fire Cosmetics pharmaceutical machinesTable Salt metal mining; also used to make rubber for tires. machinery, jewelry detectors, and fire sprinkler systems. built largely on our use of natural 1 Break into small groups of 2-4 students Mining/Extracting: The main copper-containing ores are cuprite, Mining/Extracting: There are three different ways that sulfur can Mining/extracting: Bismuth is most often extracted as a byproduct Mining/Extracting: Metallic aluminum is found in a rock bornite, malachite, azurite, and chalcopyrite. Copper is most be mined: underground, open pit, and underground melting of mining for other metals. Only Bolivia has a mine exclusively called bauxite and is mined through open pit mining and commonly mined in open pit mines, but can also be mined (injecting extremely hot water). It is also a byproduct of fossil fuel meant to extract bismuth. The major producers of bismuth are MATERIALS resources. However, natural resources and discuss: What are minerals,sometimes through and underground where mining. The major producers underground. Major copper producers are Chile, China, Peru, and extraction and is removed during the oil refining process. The major China, Mexico and Bolivia. of aluminum are Jamaica, Brazil, and Guinea (West Africa). the U.S. (Arizona, New Mexico, Montana, and Utah). producers of sulfur are the U.S., China, Russia, and Canada. T Refining: Bismuth is heated and reacted with chlorine gas, which Refining: Sulfur is refined by dry distillation, in which the solid sulfur Bauxite is crushed, washed, and dried. It is then Refining: removesRefining: other Copper metals oreand is impurities first crushed but leavesand ground the bismuth into a fine intact. powder. Special liquid mixtures are used to separate the powder copper from is heated up to produce a gas. • File of mineral cards to print, that are often overlooked include Earth’s can they be found? Write downheated and dissolved your in a specialideas solution which is filtered, Fun Facts: Bismuth subsalicylate is the compound used in Pepto- the other minerals by “frothing” and then skimming the mixture. This Fun Facts: The Kawah Ijen volcano in Indonesia has blue flames leaving an aluminum mixture behind. Solid aluminum Bismol. It works by reducing inflammation and decreasing the flow results in a copper concentrate, but it can be further refined by due to the presence of sulfur deposits, which give the lava its bluish precipitates out of this mixture and is collected. of fluids to the bowels. Bismuth alloys are also used in fire sprinkler “roasting”, smelting, oxidation, and casting so that it can then be color. Pure sulfur has no smell; it is actually other compounds that Fun Fact: In the 1800s, aluminum was more valuable than systems because bismuth melts at a low temperature. When the air downloaded at mineral resources. The minerals contained in and discuss with the class. made into other copper products. produce the rotten egg odor. These same chemicals are also what gold! becomes hot during a fire, the bismuth plug in the water pipes melt give skunks their foul smell! andFun release Fact: the The water. Statue of Liberty is made of 179,000 pounds of copper! http://geologymuseum. rocks are just as vital to make the things we 2 Think about and make a list ofSources: everyday aluminum.org; mineralseducationcoalition.org ; nma.org Sources: mineralseducationcoalition.orgSources: copperalliance.org.uk; Wikipedia.org; nma.org Sources: generalkinematics.com; smithsonianmag.org; rutgers.edu/images/PDFs/ need as are water and fossil fuel resources. objects that might be made from minerals. mineralmatchingcards.pdf 3 Obtain a packet of mineral cards from your • Computer with internet Our earliest human ancestors used minerals teacher. Arrange them on a table with the access, printer, and paper to to shape tools out of stone. Ancient Egyptian, cards of everyday items and productsCurrency in Fireworks print cards Greek, Roman, and Aztec societies also one row, and the cards of the minerals in a • Scissors used minerals in their everyday lives. Valued second row. • Glue, tape, or laminator to for their unique properties, minerals help 4 Work together to match the everyday match the front and backs humans achieve new advances in technology, product with the mineral from which it is of cards build everything from cars to spaceships, and made. Continue until you have matched

• Pencils and paper even help keep us healthy. all 20 sets of cards. Card game by Geological Society of America, Rutgers Geology 5 Check your answers by flipping the Cans Museum and TERC.Upset Copper-Stomach image: Johnathan Medications Zander, CC BY-SA 2.5 Look around the room. You are surrounded mineral card over and reading through the by minerals that make up the bricks, tiles, information to find the correct mineral use 9 Think about the teams that would need windowpanes, concrete, plumbing and illustrated on each card. to work together to make these mining wiring running through the walls, and even 6 Read through the information provided on methods a success. Make a list of three to

the walls themselves. In this activity you will the cards and write down any additional four professionalsAttribution: ParentingPatch(scientists,, CC BY-SA 3.0 engineers, examine some ways minerals are used in our everyday objects or uses of minerals you etc.) who would work together to everyday lives. missed in step 2. accomplish this. 7 Look at your list and record answers to 10 Finally, minerals are a nonrenewable NGSS CONNECTIONS the following and discuss with others: resource, and their extraction has many Source: Geological Society of • Science and Engineering Practices — What mineral-based product surprised effects on local ecosystems. Write down America. Adapted with permission. Obtaining, Evaluating, and Communicating you? Which one is the most important for three ways the environment would Activity written by Lauren Information; Asking Questions and society, and why? change, for better or worse, as a result of Neitzke Adamo, Julia Criscione, Ria Sarkar, and Carla McAuliffe in Defining Problems 8 The terms “open pit” and “underground mining operations. Discuss your ideas. collaboration with the Geological • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Human Impacts mining” are used to describe the methods Society of America, the Rutgers on Earth Systems; Natural Resources of extracting minerals from the ground. For K-5 students: Do steps 1-5 only, then Geology Museum (https:// geologymuseum.rutgers.edu/) and • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Structure and Choose one of these methods and discuss natural resources and minerals with TERC (https://www.terc.edu/). Function; Patterns research the process online. your teacher. Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2

New Year’s Day Jan. 1–31, 2021: Hawai’i Volcano Awareness Month 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Did You Know?  Did You Know?  Cleveland Abbe Becomes the Voyageurs National Park, Chief Scientist of the Newly Featuring Some of North Formed U.S. Weather Service, America’s Oldest Rocks, 1871 Established 1975 10 11 12 13 14 15 16

Jan. 10–14, 2021: Geoscience Event:  Did You Know?  Happy Birthday!  AMS Annual Meeting, American Earthquake (Magnitude 7.0) Arthur Holmes, British Geologist, Meteorological Society, New Strikes Capital of Haiti, Causing Pioneer of Radioactive Dating of Orleans, Louisiana Nearly 300,000 Deaths, 2010 Minerals, Born 1890 17 18 19 20 21 22 23

Happy Birthday!  Benjamin Franklin, U.S. Scientist, Pioneering Inventor and Diplomat, Born 1706 Happy Birthday!  Andrija Mohorovicic, Croatian Did You Know?  Physicist, Seismologist and Northridge Earthquake Meteorologist, Namesake of (Magnitude 6.7) Strikes Los Base of Earth’s Crust, the “Moho,” Angeles Area, California, 1994 Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Born 1857 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

Did You Know?  Earthquake (Magnitude 8.7–9.2) Happy Birthday!  Occurs Along the Cascadia Friedrich Mohs, German Subduction Zone and Causes a Geologist and Mineralogist, Tsunami on the Coast of Japan, Creator of Scale of Mineral 31 1700 Hardness, Born 1773

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org January 2021 February 2021

LEARNING ACTIVITY: Sifting Stones

GRADES 3-8 very day the aggregate industry sifts A pile of randomly sized natural gravel and piles of the screened separate sized products, millions of tons of rock pieces to make each of which meets specifications for particular use in construction projects. MATERIALS Eimportant and valuable construction Images courtesy of the Ohio Aggregate and Industrial Minerals Association. • 2 lb (1 L) crushed stone materials from raw resources of crushed of random sizes smaller stone or gravel. Engineers specify size ranges than 1.5 inch (38 mm) (can of rock pieces to be used to make concrete, 2 Estimate the amount (weight or volume) be purchased from local asphalt, and so on. We depend on concrete of material retained on Screen A, then landscape/hardware store) or asphalt for sidewalks, highways, and estimate the amount retained by Screen B, • Screen with 0.5 inch basement floors and walls, among many and then estimate the amount passing (12.7 mm) holes (Screen A) other things — in fact, more than 20,000 through Screen B. Added together these and screen with 1/8 inch pounds (10 tons) of size-specific aggregates should add up to 100 percent. (3 mm) holes (Screen B) are needed for every person per year in the (screens may be made using United States! 3 Assume the material coarser than hardware cloth or purchased Screen A is worth $15/ton, the next or borrowed from a local In this exercise you will sift (screen, as it is smaller material is worth $10/ton, and ready-mix concrete or known in the industry) randomly sized rocks the dust worth $3/ton. What is the value A technician using a screen to sort rock particles. aggregate supplier) into groups of specified size ranges. This of 10 tons of material sized to each these Image courtesy of the Gilson Company. process not only allows the screened product specifications? Using the estimated to meet an engineer’s requirements for use, percentages, which resulting pile is but also increases the value of the material most valuable? Go to www.MineralsEducationCoalition. over the value of the original, random- org/esw for an accompanying video sized material. 4 Discuss: and lesson plan and more detailed • What size would you try to maximize for standards correlations. PROCEDURE production? Minimize? 1 Take the crushed stone and sift it using • What factors affect the size of Screen A. This produces (on top) the the materials (such as geologic, NGSS CONNECTIONS clean, crushed stone that is used along equipment, production)? • Science and Engineering Practices — with sand and Portland cement to make • Where could the type of rock you used Planning and Carrying Out Investigations concrete pavement. Use Screen B to sift be obtained in nature? Where have you • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Earth and what fell through. What stays on Screen B seen a mine or quarry? Human Activity Source: Minerals Education Coalition. Adapted is the “chips” used with sand and asphalt • How would you design a machine to • Crosscutting Concepts — Scale, with permission. to make asphalt pavement. sort rock pieces by size? Proportion and Quantity Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3 4 5 6

Did You Know?  The First of Five Strong Earthquakes (Magnitude 7.0) Groundhog Day Hit the Region of Calabria in Southern Italy and Produce World Wetlands Day Significant Tsunamis, 1783 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

International Day of Women and Girls in Science Did You Know?  Happy Birthday!  Earthquake (8.8 Magnitude) Did You Know?  Charles Darwin, Shakes Chile, Triggering a Death Valley National Park, English Naturalist, Tsunami that Hits Hawai’i, Lowest Below Sea Level in North “The Origin of Species” Author, 2010 America, Proclaimed 1933 Born 1809 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

Presidents Day Did You Know?  Happy Birthday!  John Glenn Becomes First Galileo Galilei, American to Orbit the Earth, Italian Astronomer, Physicist Flying Aboard Spacecraft Valentine’s Day and Engineer, Born 1564 Ash Wednesday Friendship 7, 1962 21 22 23 24 25 26 27

Did You Know?  Charles M. Hall, a Young U.S. Did You Know?  Chemist, Invents an Inexpensive Grand Canyon National Park, Method for Producing Aluminum Exhibiting Largest Section Feb. 21–27, 2021: by Separating It from Its of Geologic Time on Earth, National Engineers Week Bauxite Ore, 1886 Established 1919 28

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org February 2021 March 2021

LEARNING ACTIVITY: Modeling an Oil Reserve

GRADES 8-12 ince 1970, oil and natural gas have provided more than half of the energy MATERIALS Sused each year in the United States to • Probe gently through the sand. Look • A cardboard box or other produce electricity, heat, transportation fuels, at the skewer for evidence of “oil.” This opaque container with and many everyday products from balloons models the drilling process. Remember: cardboard lid to vitamins. Oil and natural gas are forms of Every centimeter of depth that you • Sand petroleum, a word that literally means “oily drill costs $150,000. In addition, each • Marker pens rock.” Petroleum is called a fossil fuel because time you move to a new spot to drill • Clear plastic drinking straws it is geologically very old and is found in the costs $75,000. • Graph paper ground, like fossils. • Place a lid securely on the box and • Small rock samples fasten it with masking tape. Exchange • Keep a record of how many centimeters • Balloon with water Abundant oil and natural gas form only your model with another group. you drill and how many times you • Food coloring where conditions in the Earth are just move the skewer to a new spot, so • Masking tape right. Doing this investigation will help you 2 With the other group’s box, you will you can calculate the total cost of your • Bamboo kebab skewer understand how geoscientists identify and model the method used by exploration exploration. Continue drilling until you explore petroleum-rich reserves. geologists in the field. You may not move find “oil.” the box, and you may not look inside it. PROCEDURE Attach graph paper to the lid of the box. 4 What was the total cost of your 1 In a small box or opaque container set Tap on the box and listen for an area that exploration? If you were to start over, up the model similar to the one shown “sounds different.” Use the graph paper to how would you change your exploration in the illustration. Place a small balloon record the locations of areas that sound procedure to save money? Compare your containing colored water (to represent different and seem like likely candidates results with the group that constructed oil) into the layers. Think carefully about for oil exploration. the model. Look at their map. Was the where to place your oil reserves in the oil deposit where they said it should be? model. Putting it in the middle might be 3 Probe the box to search for “oil” (the water What could you have done to make your too obvious, or placing it against the side balloon) in the places you identified. exploration more cost-effective? of the box might be too confusing! Mark off divisions of one centimeter on a bamboo skewer, beginning at the bottom. NGSS CONNECTIONS • Mark the sides of the box “North,” Use the bamboo skewer to penetrate the • Science and Engineering Practices — Source: Adapted with permission “South,” “East,” and “West.” Make a map of box lid at the location where you think the Developing and Using Models by the American Association your model to show the location of the oil may be located. • Disciplinary Core Ideas — of Petroleum Geologists from water-balloon “oil reserve.” Natural Resources AGI’s Earth System Science in the Community (EarthComm). • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Systems and Illustrations: AGI/Stuart Armstrong System Models Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3 4 5 6

Did You Know?  United States Geological Survey Founded, 1879 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

Happy Birthday!  Happy Birthday!  Vladimir Vernadsky, John Playfair, Scottish Russian-Soviet Mineralogist and Mathematician, Physicist, and Geochemist Who Is Considered Geologist, Author of “Illustrations One of the Founders of of the Huttonian Theory of the Geochemistry, Biogeochemistry, Earth,” 1748 and Radiogeology, 1863 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

Daylight Saving Time Begins Happy Birthday!  Vernal Equinox Albert Einstein, German-American Physicist, Author of “Theory of Happy Birthday!  Relativity,” Born 1879 Lucy Myers Wright Mitchell, Persian-American Self-Taught March 14–20, 2021:  Archaeologist Who Was One of National Groundwater the First American Women in Awareness Week St. Patrick’s Day the Field 21 22 23 24 25 26 27

Passover Begins ( Sundown) Did You Know?  Happy Birthday!  Did You Know?  Great Alaska Earthquake John Wesley Powell, Earthquake (Magnitude 7.7) in (Magnitude 9.2) Is U.S. Geologist and Venezuela Causes a New Lake to Second-Largest of 20th Century Anthropologist, Grand Canyon Form and the River Yurubí to be and Largest Recorded in World Water Day World Meteorological Day Explorer, Born 1834 Dammed Up Northern Hemisphere, 1964 28 29 30 31

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org March 2021 Photos of student April 2021 drifter designs. Kama Almasi

LEARNING ACTIVITY: Engineering Biodegradable Drifters

GRADES 7-10 rifter buoys, or drifters, are scientific PROCEDURE equipment that collect data from the 1 Divide into small groups to build your MATERIALS Dsurface of a body of water. Drifters drifter buoy, perhaps as shown in the • Oranges, apples, allow scientists to track currents, temperature, photos above. Be creative, and decorate and potatoes salinity, and other factors as they float freely your drifter with permanent markers. • Twigs or bamboo skewers and transmit information. The materials will ensure that your drifter • Corn-based eating utensils floats, and that is what matters most. • Wooden toothpicks The National Oceanic and Atmospheric • Dried seaweed, corn husks, Administration (NOAA) has hundreds of 2 Test your drifter buoy in a local creek, or other biodegradable drifter buoys across the globe. These drifters stream, or any naturally moving water. NOAA Teacher at Sea Dieuwertje “DJ” Kast, ready sheets (e.g., cotton or gather and share information and are Wear clothes you can get wet and closed- to deploy a drifter buoy from the NOAA ship Henry bamboo) for flags or sails powered by batteries in the round floating toed shoes or waders. Bring measuring B. Bigelow. NOAA/Teacher at Sea/Jerry Prezioso • Permanent markers body of the buoy. Attached to the floating tape, stopwatches, and paper for data • Long-handled net body is a “drogue.” The canvas or nylon recording. You may want a long-handled 4 Back in the classroom, calculate group • Stopwatches drogue, which looks like a tail towed behind net to catch any drifters that escape. drifter speeds. You will start with your • Pen and paper to use as the buoy, can extend many meters below distance (50 meters) divided by your a datasheet the surface of the water. It allows the buoy 3 Divide your group into two sub-groups. time in seconds to calculate the speed in to be pulled by currents beneath the surface, One sub-group will stand upstream at meters per second (m/s). not just pushed by winds from above. NOAA the drop-off location. The other will stand mainly uses drifters in ocean waters, but they 50 meters downstream for pick-up. You can then calculate time required for can also be useful in freshwater. • Set up start and finish lines using strings. drifters to travel over longer distances, such • Drop-off teams stand in the center of as to the entrance to the ocean. You can use You can explore data from these buoys and the stream with their drifter. When all this information to calculate how long it apply to “adopt” one with the NOAA Adopt a teams are ready, at the agreed-upon would take a piece of debris from your local Drifter Program. Visit www.adp.noaa.gov to signal, release drifters while pick-up waterway to drift to the ocean. learn more. In this activity, you will design and teams start the stopwatches. build a biodegradable drifter and calculate • Pick-up teams grab the drifters as they NGSS CONNECTIONS the surface current speed of a small body float to the finish line and record time • Science and Engineering Practices — of water. on a datasheet. Developing and Using Models • Then, have your groups move • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Human Impacts downstream and repeat the steps above on Earth Systems Source: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. to average data and predict overall • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Analyzing and Adapted with permission. stream velocity. Interpreting Data Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3

April Fool’s Day Did You Know?  Earthquake (Magnitude 7.9) on Did You Know?  Hawai’i Island Caused a Landslide Start of Midwest Flood of Upper and Tsunami. The Aftershock Mississippi River Basin That Sequence for This Event has Would Cover Nine Midwestern Continued Up to the Present and Great Plains States, 1993 day, 1868 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

April 8–11, 2021: April 7–11, 2021: Geoscience Event:  Geoscience Event:  NSTA National Conference on AAG Annual Meeting, American Science Education, National Association of Geographers, Science Teachers Association, Passover Ends Seattle, Washington Chicago, Illinois 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

Happy Birthday!  Did You Know?  Did You Know?  Marie Maynard Daly, American Arches National Park, World’s Start of Mount Eyjafjallajökull Biochemist, the First Black Highest Concentration of Eruption in Iceland, Grounding American Woman in the U.S. Natural Arches, Flights Across Europe for to Earn a Ph.D. in Chemistry, April 17–25, 2021: Established 1929 Almost a Week, 2010 Born 1921 National Park Week 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

Did You Know?  Did You Know?  Soviet Union Launches Salyut 1, Great 1906 San Francisco First Space Station, 1971 Earthquake (Estimated Did You Know?  Magnitude 7.8) Tears 270-Mile April 19–23, 2021: Start of Great Flood of Mississippi Rift Along San Andreas Fault, National Environmental River Valley That Would Inundate 1906 Education Week (EE Week) 27,000 Square Miles, 1927 Earth Day 25 26 27 28 29 30

Arbor Day

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org April 2021 May 2021

LEARNING ACTIVITY: Ring of Fire

GRADES 6-9 plate boundary may be shown as a line on a map that defines the edge of a tectonic plate, usually indicating where one plate meets another. Plate boundaries are further MATERIALS A divided by the direction that the two plates are moving relative to one another. • Computer with internet access and printer When plates are moving towards one another, the zone of contact is called a convergent • Paper plate boundary. When plates are moving away from each other, it is called a divergent plate • Colored pencils boundary. Plates sliding past each other horizontally do so at a transform plate boundary.

In this activity, you’ll identify plate boundaries as well as continents, countries, and bodies of water to become familiar with an area known as the “Ring of Fire.” (For teachers: To explore further, download the Mount Rainier National Park “Sister Mountain Project” activity online at https://tinyurl.com/y8pvo6ke.)

3 Use various library and internet resources PROCEDURE The volcanoes of the Pacific Northwest are 1 Discuss: The Pacific Rim is a such as atlases, encyclopedia, and plate part of the Ring of Fire. Mount Rainier National conglomeration of Pacific Ocean border tectonic maps to locate and label each Park, Washington. countries including Australia, Peru, item on the list with colored pencils. Courtesy of NPS Argentina, China, Russia, Japan, Canada, Students celebrate in the high and the United States, each with its 4 Go online to the “Mapping the Ring of 6 Draw in the plate boundaries of the plates cascades during a ranger program at Mount Rainier National own economic, geographic, political, Fire PowerPoint” (https://tinyurl.com/ located beneath the Pacific Ocean on your Park, Washington. environmental and cultural backgrounds. y9yxe7wy) to view a slideshow with “Pacific Rim Map.” Courtesy of NPS The countries of the Pacific Rim have a seismic maps of the Pacific Rim. During rich history of interconnected trade, travel the slideshow, pause to sketch notes To further explore this topic in the context and geologic processes known as the Ring on your map when viewing the maps of U.S. national parks, go online to Plate of Fire. How are the people living in the of seismic data of the Pacific Northwest, Tectonics & Our National Parks (www.nps. Pacific Rim interconnected and similar? Southeast Asia, and the Pacific Rim. gov/subjects/geology/plate-tectonics.htm).

2 Print up your own “Pacific Rim Map” and 5 Also during the slideshow, pause to NGSS CONNECTIONS “Mapping the Ring of Fire Handout” complete questions from the slideshow • Science and Engineering Practices — (https://tinyurl.com/yb4hxdul). on the “Mapping the Ring of Fire Student Obtaining, Evaluating, and Practice your skills at reading a map Worksheet” (https://tinyurl.com/ Communicating Information and using latitude and longitude to y78oank4). • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Plate Tectonics Source: National Park Service. identify locations. Read the handout and and Large-Scale System Interactions Adapted with permission. review instructions. • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Patterns Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1

2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Cinco De Mayo National Teachers’ Day Did You Know?  Did You Know?  U.S. Astronaut Alan Shepard Powerful Tornado (F-5) Rips Becomes First American in Space, Greensburg, Kansas, 2007 1961 National Space Day 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Did You Know?  Lewis and Clark Expedition Across Louisiana Territory Mother’s Day Begins, 1804 Armed Forces Day 16 17 18 19 20 21 22

International Museum Day Did You Know?  Did You Know?  Mount St. Helens Volcano Erupts Chile Earthquake (Magnitude 9.5) South of Seattle, Washington, Is Largest Earthquake of 1980 20th Century, 1960

23 May 23-26, 2021: 24 Did You Know?  25 26 27 28 29 Geoscience Event:  Powell Expedition to Explore AAPG Annual Convention & Grand Canyon Begins in Green Exhibition, American Association River City, Wyoming, 1869 of Petroleum Geologists, Denver, Colorado Happy Birthday!  Harry Hess, U.S. Geologist, Did You Know?  Happy Birthday!  Originator of Idea of Mammoth Cave National Park, Happy Birthday!  Milutin Milankovitch, Serbian Sea Floor Spreading, World’s Longest Cave System Sally Ride, American Astronaut, Geophysicist, Best Known for Born 1906 Memorial With 360 Mapped Miles, Physicist, and Engineer, Theory of Climate Change, 30 Day 31 Established 1926 Born 1951 Born 1879

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org May 2021 Dr. Eray Kocel connecting with local Haitian village children to in- June 2021 troduce geoscience with a fun twist by playing with land nodal system. LEARNING ACTIVITY: Credit: Eray Kocel Humanitarian Geoscience

GRADES 6-10 n December 26, 2004, deep below PROCEDURE the Indian Ocean, a powerful quake 1 Break up into groups of 3-4 students. With MATERIALS Oshook the earth. Waves up to your group, visit Geoscientists Without allows, you might briefly skim the full • Computer with 100 feet high rushed to shore. All told, the Borders® online at www.seg.org/gwb. report. Discuss in your group: What Earth internet access disaster claimed the lives of over 227,000 Read about GWB’s mission, goals, and science topics are you learning about that people in 14 countries. history to learn more about this innovative would be relevant if you were part of this program. Discuss in your group: Is this project? Plate tectonics? The water cycle? Inspired to do what they could to prevent a type of geoscience work in which you Sediments? Explorations? Other subjects? and lessen the impact of such catastrophes, could imagine yourself taking part? Why 6 Discuss also: What were the main tasks in members of the Society of Exploration or why not? the projects? What were the humanitarian Geophysicists formed a volunteer relief effort 2 Click on the “Funded Projects” icon. View goals? How were they accomplished? that came to be called Geoscientists Without the world map showing various kinds Discuss “sustainability.” Were the projects Borders® (GWB). of projects conducted by GWB teams. sustainable? Who benefited from Discuss in your group: In which type of the projects? Student using a surveying tool to Since the program’s inception in 2008, GWB project would you be most interested 7 Now, open the discussion to the whole gather data for a GWB project in has supported more than 45 projects in over in participating? Water management? classroom, and take turns allowing a South Africa. 31 countries. Each year, the program supports Archaeology? Pollution mitigation? representative of each group to briefly University of Wits/Susan Webb humanitarian efforts to aid communities Earthquake, tsunami, landslide, or volcano explain the project that it discussed. around the globe confronted with challenges preparedness? Something else? What was familiar to you from your Earth in water management, pollution mitigation, 3 Select one focus topic for your group. science studies so far? What words did you archaeology, food security, and natural Compare your group’s selection with encounter that you would need to look up hazard preparedness. those of other groups in your classroom. to understand better? What topics would Try to divide up the focus topics so that you want to study further if you were GWB projects actively involve students each group is focusing on a different topic. tackling such problems? Why? attending both the higher education 4 Now that your group has settled on a institutions in the countries where projects focus topic — say, water management — take place and where the principal use the icons on the world map to find a NGSS CONNECTIONS investigators are based. In this activity, project dealing with that focus topic that • Science and Engineering Practices — you will explore how you might take part interests the members of your group. For Obtaining, Evaluating, and in such a project, apply what you are instance, your group could choose a water Communicating Information learning about geoscience, and advance management project in South America, • Disciplinary Core Ideas — Human Impacts your own geoscience education while Africa, or Australia. on Earth Systems Source: Society of Exploration Geophysicists. Adapted solving problems. 5 Click on the icon for that project, view any • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Stability with permission. photos, and read the summary. If time and change Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3 4 5

Did You Know?  Earthquake (Magnitude 8.4) Occurs off the Coast of Southern Sumatra, Indonesia Happy Birthday!  near Enggano Island, Marks the James Hutton, Scottish Geologist, Beginning of an Ongoing Period “Father” of Modern Geology, of Seismic Activity in the Area, Born 1726 2000 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Did You Know?  Big Bend National Park, Featuring Fossilized Skeleton of Quetzalcoatlus, Largest Winged World Oceans Day Animal, Established 1944 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

Juneteenth Did You Know?  Did You Know?  The Philippines’ Mount Pinatubo Sally Ride Becomes First Did You Know?  Erupts in Second-Largest American Woman in Space, U.S. Viking 1 Becomes First Volcanic Eruption of Flying Aboard Space Shuttle Spacecraft to Land Safely on Flag Day 20th Century, 1991 Challenger, 1983 Mars, 1976 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

Did You Know?  Earthquake (Magnitude 8.4) Occurs at the Boundary Between the Nazca and South American Plates, Affecting the Peruvian regions of Arequipa, Moquegua Summer Solstice Father’s Day and Tacna, 2001 27 28 29 30

International Asteroid Day Happy Birthday!  Merle Anthony Tuve, American Did You Know?  Geophysicist, Founding Director U.S. Air Force Officer, Major of Johns Hopkins University Robert Lawrence, Becomes the Applied Physics Laboratory, First African-American Astronaut 1901 in the U.S. Space Program, 1967

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org June 2021 July 2021

LEARNING ACTIVITY: Core Sampling

GRADES 5-12 ore samples are small portions of a A close-up of core formation taken from an existing well samples in a storage tray. MATERIALS and used for geologic analysis. The C ©Shutterstock.com/farbled • 1 bag of dark sand sample is analyzed to determine porosity, • 1 bag of light sand permeability, fluid content, geologic age, and Layers of rock in • 1 bag of soil probable productivity of oil from the site. Ecuador. • 1 bag of small gravel ©Shutterstock.com/ (aquarium size) Drilling is the only way to be sure that oil and Dr. Morley Read • 10 clear plastic straws gas fields exist and exactly what is present • 1 clear plastic cup per in the formation. Core samples reveal the student (8 ounce) physical and chemical nature of the rock. • Water in a spray bottle • Plastic spoons In this activity, you will create a model • Metric ruler formation and “drill” for samples. When layering earth materials in cups, you should layer your cups differently to compare a variety of cores.

PROCEDURE 4 Use a straw to extract a core sample by 7 Discuss: What are core samples? What 1 Use the ruler to measure. Place a 1 cm pushing the straw straight down through are petroleum geologists looking for layer of one of the earth materials in the layers of the cup. If you hit rock, when they examine core samples? How the cup with a spoon. Mist with the you might find it difficult to continue. do geologists use core sampling to spray bottle of water until damp, but Consider how drill bits are used in real determine the geologic formation of not soaking. drilling to churn and break rock in the rocks and sediments when exploring for sampling path. oil and gas? 2 Place another earth material 1 cm deep on top of the first layer. Moisten this layer 5 Place your finger tightly over the top with water until damp. end of the straw and withdraw it from NGSS CONNECTIONS the cup. Observe the layers in the straw • Science and Engineering Practices — Presented by Society of Petroleum Engineers 3 Continue alternating layers of earth core sample. Analyzing and Interpreting Data materials and water. The total of layers • Disciplinary Core Ideas — The History of Source: Society of Petroleum together will be four centimeters deep in 6 Lay several core samples from different Planet Earth Engineers. Adapted with permission. the cup. cups side by side. Compare results. • Cross-Cutting Concepts — Patterns Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3

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Happy Birthday!  James B. Pollack, American Astrophysicist and Senior Space Research Scientist at NASA Ames Independence Day LGBT STEM Day Research Center, Born 1938 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

Happy Birthday!  Florence Bascom, U.S. Geologist, First American Female Ph.D., Born 1862 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

Did You Know?  Happy Birthday!  Did You Know?  Earthquake (Magnitude 5.9) John Glenn, American Astronaut, U.S. Apollo 11 Astronaut Neil Occurs in Central Peru Causing First American to Orbit Earth, Armstrong Becomes First Human Severe Damage and Flooding, Born 1921 to Walk on Moon, 1969 1969 25 26 27 28 29 30 31

International Friendship Day Did You Know?  The National Aeronautics and Happy Birthday!  Space Administration Is Founded, Marie Tharp, U.S. Geologist, Sea Parents’ Day 1958 Floor Cartographer, Born 1920

American Geosciences Institute | www.americangeosciences.org July 2021 WHAT IS EARTH SCIENCE WEEK? AGI MEMBER SOCIETIES The American Geosciences Institute has AASP - The Palynological Society Karst Waters Institute organized this annual international event since American Association of Geographers Mineralogical Society of America 1998 to help people better understand and American Association of Petroleum Geologists Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland 2020 appreciate the Earth sciences and to encourage American Geophysical Union National Association of Black Geoscientists responsible stewardship of the planet. Earth American Institute of Hydrology National Association of Geoscience Teachers Science Week takes place October 11–17, 2020, American Institute of Professional Geologists National Association of State Boards of Geology celebrating the theme “Earth Materials in American Meteorological Society National Cave and Karst Research Institute Our Lives.” American Rock Mechanics Association National Earth Science Teachers Association Association for the Sciences of Limnology National Ground Water Association Visit the Earth Science Week website — ​ and Oceanography National Speleological Society www.earthsciweek.org — ​to learn more about Association for Women Geoscientists Paleobotanical Section of the Botanical Society how you can become involved, events and Association of American State Geologists of America opportunities in your community, the monthly Association of Earth Science Editors Paleontological Research Institution Earth Science Week newsletter, highlights of past Association of Environmental & Engineering Geologists Paleontological Society Earth Science Weeks, and how you can order an Clay Minerals Society Petroleum History Institute Earth Science Week Toolkit. Council on Undergraduate Research Seismological Society of America Geo-Institute of the American Society of Civil Engineers SEPM (Society for Sedimentary Geology) You are invited to help keep the spirit of Earth Geochemical Society Society for Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration Science Week alive all year long by posting this Geological Association of Canada Society of Economic Geologists calendar in your classroom, office, or home. Geological Society of America Society of Exploration Geophysicists Whoever you are and wherever you go, you can Geological Society of London Society of Independent Professional Earth Scientists celebrate Earth science! Geoscience Information Society Society of Mineral Museum Professionals American Geosciences Institute History of Earth Sciences Society Society of Vertebrate Paleontology aerica 4220 King Street International Association of Hydrogeologists/U.S. Soil Science Society of America Alexandria, VA 22302 geoscieces National Chapter The Society for Organic Petrology (703) 379-2480 AGI istitte International Medical Geology Association United States Permafrost Association www.americangeosciences.org coectig earth sciece a eoe

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