We explored the exciting phenomenon of weathering and erosion today. The fact that water and air are both powerful enough to bring down mountains and reshape rocks was pretty interesting. But getting to try it out themselves made it so much more fun. We started with a quick demo on how trapping air in the straw made it strong enough to push through a potato, and went over the homework which helped define the terms we'd be using today.
I think everyone had a lot of fun playing around with this, and trying out different amounts of water, different landforms, and eventually just flooding the whole thing. They saw some interesting situations come up: water appeared in a volcano from under the surface, hills sliding even though the water looked like it was barely even touching the hill, and streams changing their paths. They drew diagrams of their land, before and after and we talked about what they observed during the lab.
Additional ActivitiesBooks: Cracking Up: a Story about Erosion Weathering and Erosion Videos: Nick on the Rocks This geologist has a couple dozen short (5 minutes or so) videos on various aspects of geology in the Washington State area. Evidence of how far rivers have moved, ice age mysteries, ghost forests--these are fascinating! National Geographic: Landslides A short video of live footage of different landslides from around the world. This shows just how powerful these can be. Magic School Bus Rocks and Rolls (Season 3, Episode 12) If you have Netflix, or other access to the Magic School Bus series, this is a fun one! Activities: Weathering and Erosion Demonstration Using clear gelatin and rocks and soil, you can see the difference between when land is weathered, and when it is eroded. Paper Art: Landforms This is a beautiful project exploring the different landforms on earth for any kids who like to learn through art projects. Create something like this, or go 3D and make a diorama. (Something like this would be perfect for the science fair for the early elementary age.) Mystery Science: Paper Mountains This is set up as a whole experiment, but you could keep it simple and have fun creating paper mountains and then watching what happens when you add water. Local Field Trips: Rock City, Mt. Diablo State Park The sandstone rocks here are a great example of sedimentary rock and how it can be weathered and eroded to create fascinating structures. Black Diamond Mines Tours are offered of this former coal mine and there is a visitor's center as well. Alum Rock Park, San Jose This area was known for the natural mineral springs and although many have been destroyed, you can still see some as you hike. Any time you are at the coast, or hiking, look for the layers in the cliffs, and evidence of weathering and erosion--it's all around us, all the time!
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May 2020
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