Rocks

This laboratory has two separate goals. 
  1. To learn how rocks are characterized
  2. To learn to build a slide deck using mobile apps
Questions to be explored in the laboratory:
  • What are the three basic types of rocks?
  • What is rock hardness?
  • What is rock luster?
  • What is rock breakage?
  • What is rock color streak?
  • What is the identification of your rock?
On Pohnpei there are essentially two types of rocks. The black colored rock is basalt, a combination of minerals produced by the volcanic eruptions that formed the island. Basalt can be composed of different minerals. Basalt on Pohnpei contains iron which oxidizes to form red and brown colors. The red clay soils are also high in iron. There is so much iron in the ground that well water in some places has too much iron to be consumed by us. Out in Nett there is a special facility that removes iron from the well water.

The other type of rock is coral, usually a white color. Coral is not a mineral because the origin of coral is in a living animal, coral polyps. Coral is coral skeletons.

The first goal of this laboratory is to explore rock characteristics for five rocks.


The geology laboratory provides an opportunity for students to encounter more types of rocks than the black basalt and white calcium carbonate coral rocks of the island. This laboratory is magical in a way that it would not be in a continental setting. 


The board set up after the videos on identifying minerals.


The videos also provide a buffer for late arrivals. 


This laboratory has some of the highest levels of engagement of any of the laboratories. The students are testing hardness and streak. They are using their cell phones to identify their rocks. Then using SnapSeed to perform an image reduction. 


Unica testing hardness versus glass. The glass is window glass from louvers.



Jaysleen and Darla testing and identifying their rocks. Each student is working with five rocks that they have chosen.


Jaysleen testing a rock.


The class also permits food and drink, with donuts from Namiki. Meraia and Alisha.

Meraia using her phone as a tool for learning.

Alisha

Darla in a classroom where the phones are out and in use

Leona running a photo analysis of a rock

Mor-Jacinta, Eytriann, McGievens, and Moira

Moira photographs a rock

McGievens tests hardness versus glass


Eytriann checks for the color of the streak


Cell phones as tools of learning 


McGievens sets up his Google Slides presentation - the second part of this laboratory. 


Stacy working on her phone


Blue calcite


Red jasper


Mor-Jacinta working on her presentation


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Traditional food dishes of Micronesia

Image
Clara, Jennette, and Joanie presented ground hard taro cooked in an umw, effectively a hot rock oven. Pohnpeian: rotama. Pingelapese: sero. Mwoakillese: rodma. Mortlockese: Amahd. Kosrae: rodoma. After cooking in an umw the rotama is pounded with the petiole of a palm frond. Rotama is made from hard or swamp taro, known as mwahng on Pohnpei, mweian on Pingalap, pula in Mortlockese, and pahsruhk on Kosrae. In traditional times on the outer islands the women had primary responsibility for tending the taro while the men handled fishing and climbing tasks. Joesen and Noeleen presented fermented breadfruit from the outer islands of Yap such as Woleai and Eauripik. The raw ingredients were actually brought in from Yap, Noeleen prepared the maare.  The leaf wrap is ti leaf - Cordyline fruticosa. Pauleen, Barnson, Trisha, Verginia, Con-ray, and Maylanda from Kitti, Pohnpei brought in mahi umw, koahpnoair koakihr, and uht sukusuk. Above is breadfruit umw, mahi umw, o...
Read more

Setting up a boxplot chart in Google Sheets with multiple boxplots on a single chart

Image
The  Google Statistics  add-on for Google Sheets can display multiple boxplots in a single chart. The key is the layout of the data. One column should be the variable by which the data is to be grouped, the other column should be the data to be box plotted. Set up the Statistics add-on with the data to be plotted as the variable, and the grouping column as the "by" variable. In this image I had deselected all but the boxplot option, the result was the appearance of the Moment, Standard errors, and Confidence intervals options. The default is apparently a 95% confidence interval for the mean. The result is multiple boxplots on a single chart with a common scale. The new tab that is created also quotes 95% confidence intervals for the mean. Note that as of 2018 the Google Statistics add-on cannot be found by search in the add-ons. In addition, as of May 2018 the add-on no longer verifies, possibly due to the add-on not having been updated since August 2017. One may ha...
Read more

Plotting polar coordinates in Desmos and a vector addition demonstrator

Image
In an earlier post I noted that Desmos did not directly plot polar coordinates. Not only was I incorrect, but Desmos responded to my blog to correct me! Although I had at some point seen that one could define a function f(x)=3x+5 and then have Desmos calculate f(6), I had not absorbed how this might be used to plot polar coordinates. The above works beautifully . Realizing that I could effectively program Desmos, I applied this thinking to demonstrating how to add two vectors when given the magnitudes m and the direction angles theta. The graph calculates the i and j components for the two vectors and then adds the vectors, graphically displaying the result while also providing information on the magnitude and direction of the vector sum. m1 and theta1 are the magnitude and direction angle for one of the two vectors, m2 and theta2 are the magnitude and direction for the other vector. All four are dynamically interactive and can be changed. The diagram purports to illustra...
Read more