IMPROVING ACCESS TO AND INTEGRATION OF LABORATORY AND FIELD-BASED LEARNING IN EARTH SCIENCE USING STREAMING VIDEO TECHNOLOGY
This presentation describes and demonstrates selected aspects of a web-accessible learning tool developed to improve students abilities in identifying minerals and in relating laboratory and field-based activities to the natural history of Connecticut. This work is part of a new partnership between two CSU institutions with a shared interest in liberal arts education and in developing a better understanding of the environment. We make extensive use of digital video and high quality imagery acquired both in the field and in a state-of-the-art digital television studio. Our mineral identification module includes both explanations of mineral properties and actual testing capabilities for several standard (e.g. luster, streak, hardness, cleavage/fracture) and special mineral properties (e.g. magnetism, reaction with acid, iridescence, density, etc.). We emulate approaches used in the laboratory, and plan to include web-tracking capabilities that will allow us to assess learning pathways used by our students. We also include a virtual field trip (VFT) module that features short video vignettes with expert commentary. These VFTs include examinations of minerals exposed in outcrop, sedimentary records of environmental change, glacial landforms, rift-valley volcanic and sedimentary rocks, and aspects of the structural geology of Connecticut.