It's that time of the semester, when the field trips are over, and the field trip essays start rolling in. These papers I assign are intended to be syntheses of the field trips I take my students on. I want them to interpret the landscape as a geologist would, and support each claim about geologic events in the past with supporting evidence observed or discussed on the trip.

I offer my students the opportunity to submit a rough draft of their field trip paper, and then I give them feedback about both content and formatting/writing style, so they have a chance to revise before submitting a final draft. Each semester, about a quarter of the students avail themselves of this opportunity for feedback before the "real" paper is due. Giving them quality feedback is a time-consuming process, but I feel it's important both to cement geologic concepts in their minds, and to guide them in developing their writing skills.

Accordingly, it's been a slow week for posting on this blog. I've been too busy with work. However, this morning it occurred to me that I could capitalize on my grading efforts by sharing a student essay with you all, edits and all. Why do I think you'll be interested in such a thing? (A) I think it gives some insight into the practice of teaching geology at the introductory college level, and (B) I think this is an excellent rough draft for an essay about Washington, DC's geologic history. The student's name, of course, has been redacted:

Labels: cretaceous, dc, geology, nova, ordovician, teaching

Today: a few photos of neat stuff from the Sternberg Museum of Hays, Kansas. These are from my first time through Hays this summer, in June. It's worth a stop. Some of these are from their permanant collection, and some from a travelling exhibit of fossil reconstructions called "T. Rexcetera."

Archelon, mega turtle of the Western Interior Seaway


Pterosaur -- the flying Chihuahua of its day


Plesiosaur (I like how fierce this one looks, and the contrast in colors between its teeth and its bones -- reminds me of the Joker in the Batman movies...)


Big honkin' mosasaur skull (Tylosaurus? I should have taken better notes...)


Yipes! Under the Sternberg's dome, there are reconstructed beasties...


Beautiful slab of Uintacrinus, a stalkless crinoid (more here)


I think this last one is so beautiful that I just switched my desktop background image to it (from the previous image, a geologic map of the Moon).

Labels: chalk, cretaceous, fossils, kansas