GEOLOGY IN THE NEW YORK CITY METROPOLITAN AREA AND BEYOND: CALLING STUDENTS OF ALL AGES

Early positive experiences in science make the subject exciting and satisfying by the implementation of innovative field trips in conjunction with well-planned class activities. During each “field experience” students not only use the outdoors as a laboratory, but touch, feel and collect specimens in situ. A series of trips were designed for pre-secondary classes in the metropolitan New York area, including Westchester County, as well as parts of the Hudson Valley. Sites were selected based on their accessibility, safety, and information content. Localities include caves, city streets, seashore outcrops and road cuts. Examples of questions proposed are: how can we tell if a glacier was here? How do we know when the earth's crust moved? What can fossils tell us about past environments? Each lesson is constructed such that teachers of varying science backgrounds will be able to successfully impart the subject matter to their classes. Lessons are composed of the following elements: grade level, time frame, objectives, definitions, teacher information, material, pre-trip discussion questions, procedure, references, and worksheet. Students at the post-secondary level can utilize the same outcrops by studying the rocks, structures and fossils in more depth and detail, that is, decoding more information from each site. During both elementary and post-secondary field trips several concepts are shared. First, the "processes of science" are incorporated into the experience such that students make use of the scientific method when presented with a problem-solving situation. The establishment of multiple working hypotheses is encouraged and the most parsimonious hypothesis is selected as a "working hypothesis." Second, the concept of "falsifiability" is emphasized; any valid hypothesis in science must be testable. Third, students are required to make field sketches as a means of recording data. Since efficient teaching is based on successful motivation, trips to local geologic sites capture the students' interest and help them realize how geology affects their lives directly.