This site contains information, resources and activities related to creating on-line materials for teaching in the geosciences. The site provides guidelines and tips for both the academic and technical development of internet-based learning resources. Topics addressed include how to determine when the use of web-based course materials is appropriate, how to design the educational content of those resources, and how to design and build the actual resource. Users are encouraged to add to the discussion of the web resources provided here. A list of references and links for further information are provided.

This site is a lecture from Tulane University that explores the symmetry observed in crystals. Topics covered include crystallographic axes, the crystal lattice, and unit cells. Tables and illustrations accompany the text.

This site is a lecture by Dr. Stephen Nelson from Tulane University that discusses crystallographic calculations. Topics include a review of Miller indices, axial ratios, angles corresponding to a Miller Index, and angles between crystallographic axes in monoclinic or triclinic systems. Step by step examples of the calculations are provided, including associated illustrations and diagrams.

Students are provided with the vocabulary, concepts, and context to understand the impact of climate change on the hydrological cycle. Students make observations throughout a series of demonstrations and activities regarding how temperature affects the phases of water and connect these ideas to the physical environment.

Students experiment with density by placing different substances and objects into empty pill bottles and placing them into water.

Students work collaboratively using data maps to discover plate tectonic boundary processes. Data sets used are earthquakes, volcanoes, seafloor age, and topography.

This site provides Flash animations that illustrate form variations in sand dunes. Visualizations, photographs and supporting text demonstrate the conditions necessary to produce various dune shapes, including longitudinal, crescent, star, parabolic and transverse dunes. These resources may be integrated into lectures, labs or other activities.

Students will construct an ecocolumn and use it to study the interaction between the geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere.

This site features earthquake related Flash animations and real video footage. The visualizations illustrate how seismographs work, p and s waves, earthquake foci versus epicenters, tsunami formation, as well as an earthquake video recorded by security cameras. These resources portray a variety of environments and are suitable for use in lectures, labs, or other teaching activities.

Students investigate the effects of distance and angle on the input of solar radiation at the Earth's surface, the role played by albedo, and the heat capacity of land and water.

This site features visual resources that illustrate the deglaciation of North America after the last glacial maximum. Animations and supporting text demonstrate glacial retreat and the flooding of the Bering Land Bridge between Alaska and Russia. These resources may be incorporated into lectures, labs, and other activities.

This site is a lecture by Dr. Stephen Nelson from Tulane University that explores the 32 possible combinations of symmetry operations that define the external symmetry of crystals. The lecture defines the six crystal systems (triclinic, monoclinic, orthorhombic, tetragonal, hexagonal, and isometric) and explains the derivation of the Hermann-Mauguin symbols (also called the international symbols) used to describe the crystal classes from the symmetry content. Tables and illustrations accompany the text.

Students conduct research to determine whether plate tectonics is operating at any other location in the solar system.

These lecture notes are part of a series of lectures available on the geology department website at Tulane University. Topics covered include criteria for the classification of igneous rocks, field identification of minerals present in hand sample, thin section examination and chemical analysis. The general chemical classification covers silica content (silica saturation), aluminum saturation, and alkaline and subalkaline rocks. This resource is part of the Teaching Petrology collection. http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/petrology03/index.html

This website provides an overview of the GeoPad project, the software and hardware components of the unit, and a listing of publications, presentations, and case studies. The GeoPad is a TabletPC equipped with wireless networking, a portable GPS receiver, digital camera, microphone-headset, voice-recognition software, GIS software, and supporting, digital, geo-referenced data-sets. The unit allows scientists to go out in the field as a group or individually, collect GPS-referenced data and share the data instantaneously with each other and with data fusion "collaboratories" hundreds of miles away. It also provides on-demand access to the large database, data summarization and visualization resources at these distant centers to request site-specific information.

This site from the "On the Cutting Edge" workshop series contains a collection of activities that can be used in undergraduate geochemistry courses. The collection includes lab exercises, classroom activities, problem sets and more.

This site provides animations, images, interactive maps and videos that can be used to teach about the concept of geologic time. Visual resources cover some specific topics of earth history including plate tectonics, continental drift, relative age dating and paleontology. These resources are appropriate for an introductory level geology course.

This excerpt from the CRC Standard Mathematical Tables and Formulas covers geometry, excluding differential geometry. It is a reference for advanced students, and covers the material in quick, condensed sections of notes. Notes and diagrams are organized into sections and subsections, starting with coordinate systems, plane transformations, lines, and polygons in two-dimensional geometry. The section on three-dimensional geometry covers coordinate systems in space, space symmetries, directions, polyhedra, spheres, and quadrics. This resource is part of the Teaching Quantitative Skills in the Geosciences collection. http://serc.carleton.edu/quantskills/

This site provides visual resources and supporting material about how glaciers modify the landscape. Animations and movies illustrate both depositional and erosional landforms such as moraines, outwash plains, U-shaped valleys, cirques, and hanging waterfalls. These resources may be incorporated into lectures, labs, and other activities.

This 16-slide PowerPoint presentation discusses the characteristics of granitoid rocks including geographic occurrence, rare earth elements, enclave characteristics, pressure-temperature conditions, the influence of water, and tectonic setting. This resource is part of the Teaching Petrology collection. http://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/petrology03/index.html