In this lesson, students will develop understanding of the structure of the Earth’s interior by constructing a scale model of a “slice” of the interior of the Earth and studying the material properties of Earth’s interior. The activity also provides useful practice with the concept of scale.

The Interdisciplinary Journal of Problem-based Learning (IJPBL) publishes relevant, interesting, and challenging articles of research, analysis, or promising practice related to all aspects of implementing problem-based learning (PBL) in K–12 and post-secondary classrooms.

In this lesson, students will take a simulated journey to the center of the Earth to learn more about the structure, material properties and conditions within the Earth's interior. As an optional extension, students can read Jules Verne's science fiction novel or watch the movie based on the book and make comparisons between the fiction and the reality.

In this lesson, students create a plot of worldwide earthquake epicenters to display the narrow zones of seismic activity of the Earth and aid in an understanding of plate tectonics.

This resource guides students through the prewriting (invention) process with guided questions and strategies to help generate a starting point and organization.

This activity is designed to provide a better understanding of earthquake activity, the locations of faults, and earthquake hazards in the San Francisco bay area. The activity utilizes a satellite image of the bay area on which earthquake epicenters from 1970 - 2003 have been plotted. Students will answer a series of questions based on analysis of the maps.

This teaching guide is designed to introduce the concepts of waves and seismic waves that propagate within the Earth, and to provide ideas and suggestions for how to teach about seismic waves. The guide provides information on the types and properties of seismic waves and instructions for using some simple materials – especially the slinky – to effectively demonstrate characteristics of seismic waves and wave propagation. Most of the activities described in the guide are useful both as demonstrations for the teacher and as exploratory activities for students.

In this lesson, students will demonstrate plate tectonic principles, plate boundary interactions, and the geometry and relative motions of faulting of geologic layers using 3-D foam models.

In this lesson, students create a flipbook to illustrate the breakup of the super-continent Pangea over the past 190 million years and chart the subsequent movement of landmasses.