Rocks and minerals


Sensing that the students would not see what was connecting together the rapid fire change of topics that the summer brings, I opened with reminder of the layout of the course and noted where were are at the moment. The morning session was a series of videos on vulcanology. The last video was only there as an option.


Perhaps I was too sleepy after a filling lunch, perhaps I over estimated the student's ability to pull the above from Canvas on their devices, but by party way through the lab session I realized that the students thought that mineral identification was the only goal of the laboratory. Getting this onto the board and explaining this was six questions for each of ten rocks or a total of 60 answers helped the students. 

Marmayon, A-Ann, Fancylynn

Pennies were a new addition to the laboratory with a hardness of three. 

Marmayon

The tiles were our scratch plates. Broken louvers were our glass scratch plates. Improvise everything.

Fancylynn

Benalyne

Piruno

Joanalynn, L-Jane

Darx

Cordny, Ivan

Gypsum. Photo for use with Google Lens


The students remain involved and engaged at a level that surprised me last spring and again this summer. The students have not seen, let along held, rocks other than basalt and calcium carbonate. A world that is black and white and suddenly there is color. The students remained actively engaged for over two hours. 


The rock kits are those one might order for adolescents or older children. An important feature of this approach is that the rocks are not mounted. The students can pick them up, feel them. Touch and heft are important. This is a tactile laboratory.

Tigers eye

No rock on this island is banded. 


Or looks like this. 

Benalyne

The macro lens helps


When given a good image, Google Lens is surprisingly capable at narrowing down the possible identification of a rock type. Google Lens is also available for iPhone. 

This remains the sleeper surprise laboratory. The lab was intended to be a one off to handle an extra Thursday spring 2023. A second successful term with this laboratory suggests keeping it in the lab rotation. 

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