New Online Resources for Teaching Introductory-Level Geoscience Courses

Introductory courses at the undergraduate level play a pivotal role in the geosciences. They serve as recruiting grounds for majors and future professionals, provide critical experiences in geoscience for pre-service teachers, and offer opportunities to influence future policy makers, business people, professionals, and citizens. An introductory course is also the only course in geoscience that most of our students will ever take. Participants in the “Cutting Edge” workshop on Teaching Introductory Geoscience in the 21st Century have contributed course descriptions and activities to online collections hosted by the Science Education Resource Center. Educators looking for ideas for their own courses can browse or search either collection via the Teaching Introductory Geoscience website: http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/intro/index.html.

New additions to the Starting Point website (http://serc.carleton.edu/introgeo/index.html) also support effective teaching in entry-level geoscience courses. The First Day of Class webpages (http://serc.carleton.edu/introgeo/firstday/index.html) describe several different ways to focus on student learning, starting on the first day of class, and include a collection of example activities. Starting your course by engaging students with course material or motivating student learning on the very first day is a powerful way to set the stage for the remainder of the term. The webpages on Just-in-Time Teaching (http://serc.carleton.edu/introgeo/justintime/index.html) have been revised and significantly expanded, focusing on the details on classroom implementation. Just-in-Time Teaching is an effective way to engage students in the learning process, via online homework questions about reading assignments and follow-up in-class discussion and collaborative exercises.