Title: The Life and Times at the Geothermal Vents

Contributing Teacher: Elizabeth Youngman, Phoenix Country Day School, November 2003

Suggested Grade Levels: grades 7-12

Time required: 2-3 class periods for the basic activity, more depending on the extensions and options such as the lab.

Materials and Technology Needed:

Internet resources for looking at the internet sites.To complete the graphing and data analysis section, excel or a similar spreadsheet program is needed. Paper copies of world maps, available at http://pubs.usgs.gov/publications/text/baseball.html help to begin the discussion. If doing the introductory lab the lab materials are; shoeboxes, clay, styrofoam and chopsticks. A globe or world seafloor map are also useful.

Safety Considerations:

When using the internet, students must be made aware of the school's acceptable use policy and be supervised by an adult. The sea floor in a shoe box lab is pretty straight forward. However if the students build their own shoe box models, they may need help poking the holes in the boxes without hurting themselves.( I recommend doing this part ahead of time for best results and fewer safety concerns)

Teacher Preparation:

To prepare for this activity it is important to review the links and have a back up plan if the computers are not working. I photocopy a list of instructions for each student to use while working on the project. I would also download and print out the data sets of the temperature data to use that work with the questions for demonstration purposes and as a backup. This activity meshes nicely with a lab, so that will need to be set up as well. The lab set up involves shoe boxes, clay and styrofoam and a chop stick to make into a depth probe. Depending on class time and focus there are many, many activities and resources on the NeMO site. Teachers may want to use the powerpoint presentations available on the site. To insure the best performance and resolution, they should be down-loaded ahead of time, this takes several minutes depending on connection speed.

Objectives and Learning Outcomes:

By the completion of these activities:

Purpose:

In order to fully explain the theory of plate tectonics it was necessary to map the sea floor. This mapping lead to the discovery of many fascinating undersea features. One of these features, the geothermal vent, occurs at plate boundaries, ridge and rift zones. Geothermal vents, found at sites such as this produce extremely hot water temperatures. In this activity set we travel to the Juan de Fuca plate off the coast of Oregon with an undersea mapping and research project. The purpose of this activity is for students to learn more about sea floor mapping and especially about geothermal vents and how they are used to monitor plate activity. Students will also engage in data and make a graph.

Procedure:

Background Reading: There are many good internet sites that have background information about plate tectonics and sea floor mapping. I chose this site from the USGS to begin. http://pubs.usgs.gov/publications/text/exploring.html

Depending on the individual class this may be assigned as homework or presented in class. Since my students have had a year of Earth Science before we study Oceanography I would use only the sea floor mapping section and present it as a lecture. The other sections from this site could be read as review. http://pubs.usgs.gov/publications/text/

Lab: In order to appreciate the difficulty of sea floor mapping I like to use this lab activity. Seafloor in a Shoe box. It can be done with colored pencils and graph paper, excel or with an image processing program.

lab handout

NeMO activity: Students should log into the internet and go to the NeMO web site. http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/vents/nemo/index.html

There are many excellent resources on this site. For this activity, students will answer questions about the data from a deep sea vent that can be found here:http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/vents/nemo/realtime/index.html

Student handout for NeMO activity

Results / Analysis: From the engagement with large sets of data, students should come away with an appreciation for how trends are visualized.

Teacher reflections:

I choose to create this activity to do with my students for several reasons. First, I was looking for a way to tie together their 7th grade Earth Science class and my 8th grade Oceanography study. The sea floor is extremely fascinating to students because it is unknown and has a great many odd creatures. I added the analyzing and graphing to the project as a way to have students really engage in the data from one vent and as a way to begin having them understand data. I have not done this activity with my classes since I am now done with the oceanography unit for this year. I have, however, done the mapping lab and students have enjoyed that activity.

I have learned a lot about the sea floor and plate tectonics in my preparation for this project and think that the combination will intrigue students. I plan to have the 7th grade teacher look over the lesson before I try it out.

Extensions: There are many lessons built into the NeMO site, one could spend months with this project!

Assessment Suggestions: Students can hand in their data analysis worksheets for a grade. I also grade the lab work. Another interesting assessment would be to return to the world map and ask students where they might expect to find other such undersea vents / volcanoes. Then research those regions.

Standards Addressed:

National Standards:

Program Standard C - The science program should be coordinated with the mathematics program to enhance student use and understanding of mathematics in the study of science.

Content Standard D - Structure of the Earth System: Lithospheric plates on the scales of continents and oceans constantly move at rates of centimeters per year in response to movements in the mantle. Major geological events, such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and mountain building, result from these plate motions.

Content Standard E Science and Technology - Science and technology are reciprocal. Science helps drive technology, as it addresses questions that demand more sophisticated instruments and provides principles for better instrumentation and technique. Technology is essential to science, because it provides instruments and techniques that enable observations of objects and phenomena that are otherwise unobservable due to factors such as quantity, distance, location, size, and speed. Technology also provides tools for investigations, inquiry, and analysis.

Arizona Standards:

6SC-P3. Use the theory of Plate Tectonics to explain relationships among earthquakes, volcanoes, mid-ocean ridges and deep sea trenches.

References / Resources:

Background Materials:

Image Processing program a free download for PC or Mac: can be found here http://rsb.info.nih.gov/ij/
to learn more about Image processing and GIS in education visit this site: http://www.cipe.com/ there are many interesting free downloadable lessons here.

The NeMO site: Look at one particular sea floor volcano at the NeMO site here
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/vents/nemo/index.html

More great interactive lessons can be found here: http://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov they also offer a free CD_ROM of their site for people with limited internet access.