EXPLORING THE ICE AGE PERIOD AT THE RUTGERS GEOLOGY MUSEUM: AN INFORMAL LEARNING EXPERIENCE

Learning occurs across all age groups in formal settings, such as classrooms, as well as in informal environments, such as museums and science centers (National Research Council; 2010). While the structure of the informal setting differs from that of the classroom, studies have shown that learning in museums positively stimulates student engagement (Borun et al., 1995; Falk and Dierking; 2000; and others). The aim of this project was to create a fun and engaging active-learning activity focusing on the last ice age in New Jersey (~20,000 years ago) to be administered during a Rutgers Geology Museum event. Drawing from a preliminary literature review about the effectiveness of different teaching methods, we selected the ice age as our topic for this activity in order to increase comprehension, engagement, and retention in primary and elementary aged students within the following three key content areas: (1) animal adaptations, (2) geologic time, and (3) climate change.

After examining environmental reconstructions from both the ice age and today, students will be asked to create a fictional animal by choosing from a range of body sizes, shapes, a variety of limbs, and other adaptations such as fur types and color patterns. The activity will focus on deductions about what traits an animal would need to exist successfully in each environment. By comparing how the same animal would fare in both environments, students will get a sense of the organism’s chance of survival and the importance of natural selection and adaptation over time as Earth’s climate changes. Moreover, the use of inductive learning processes will allow students to retain this information more successfully.

We are currently working on the creation of a pre- and post-test questionnaire and an analysis of information retention by participants across the different age groups and demographics. All aspects of this activity are aligned with the standards outlined in the Next Generation Science Standards and materials are available upon request.