VIRTUAL FIELD TRIPS OF MICHIGAN: VFT-MICHIGAN ROCKS!

The goal of VFT-Michigan Rocks is to give secondary students the opportunity to visit geological sites that they may not otherwise be able to see. To meet this goal I propose building several virtual field trips set in Michigan for the web for primary use by Michigan secondary school teachers. The field trips will be accompanied by lesson plans for teachers and will address the Michigan benchmarks.

The next generation of students will not become excited about exploring the earth if they are never able to go on a field trip due to costs. Field trips are also part of the “hands-on” component of earth science education. Some aspects of earth science can never really be simulated in the classroom and the only way to observe parts of earth science is to get out into the real world and see for one's self.

VFT-Michigan Rocks! will provide learning exercises and a formal assessment the results of which will be emailed directly to the teacher. The learning exercises will be associated with different parts of the field trip. These exercises will be a means of formative assessment for the teacher. As the students complete the exercises, the teacher is informed that they have completed that portion of the field trip by completing an assessment, which is emailed directly to the teacher. Differentiation occurs since the teacher knows when students have completed different parts of the VFT, and she/he will be able to set goals for individual students.

After the first VFT has been completed, teachers in the Ann Arbor area will test it. The students in one class will take a pretest on the subject of the VFT, while another class will do the traditional lesson plan the teacher has prepared, therefore acting as the control. After completing the VFT, both classes will again take the same test as a post-test. This will determine how much learning has been accomplished according to the standards being addressed.

This proposal is different because of the ability to have preservice teachers learn and work on a VFT. Between 1993 and 2002, Eastern Michigan University has been the nation's largest producer of professional educators. Science teacher qualifications wil be improved by working with preservice teachers to use data available on the web creatively and addressing the NCATE standards for science teacher preparation.