GeoMapApp and MARGINS Mini-Lessons: Cutting-Edge Resources for Modern Educators

The NSF MARGINS program, a decade-long multi-disciplinary investigation covering major scientific questions in the evolution of continental margins (http://www.margins-nsf.org), has produced a number of key results that are changing our view of these complex systems. Whilst it will be some time before these key findings are incorporated in next-generation undergraduate textbooks, MARGINS researchers and educators have created a broad suite of ready-to-use education modules to highlight some of these results. The hands-on undergraduate-level modules, called MARGINS mini-lessons, range from short interactive activities to multi-session units. Hosted by the Science Education Resource Centre at Carleton College, the mini-lessons (http://serc.carleton.edu/margins/collection.html) cover all four MARGINS initiatives. Examples include teaching activities on geochemical inputs and outputs at subduction zones; volcanoes of central America; insights from scientific drilling; sediment production across margins; margin morphology and earthquake/volcano locations; and, the tectonic factors behind historical earthquakes. Each mini-lesson includes a comprehensive educator guide, information on data sets and resources, and suggested assessment rubrics. GeoMapApp (www.geomapapp.org), a free data exploration and visualisation tool that works on any computer, has wide application across the geosciences for both research and education and is used in many of the MARGINS mini-lessons. GeoMapApp contains an extraordinary wealth of built-in and linked data sets, allowing users to rapidly and conveniently explore geo-referenced data from multiple sources, to generate compelling visualisations, and to create custom maps and grids. Developed by the group that hosts the MARGINS database (http://www.marine-geo.org/portals/margins/), GeoMapApp contains seamless links to MARGINS data and to information about MARGINS land and marine field programs. A user guide, multi-media tutorials, and webinar are available and contain examples of using these resources in MARGINS mini-lessons. MARGINS MediaBank (http://media.marine-geo.org/album/margins), an on-line gallery, uses web technology to serve a number of downloadable, searchable images from the NSF MARGINS project. Examples of MARGINS mini-lessons, GeoMapApp and MARGINS MediaBank will be shown.