Virtual Seismologist

Today, my students are becoming Virtual Seismologists (by the power vested in me, and the internet : ) ).  I found The Virtual Seismologist Activity a few years ago, and have been doing it in class with my students ever since.  This virtual lab gives students the opportunity to find the epicenter and magnitude of a fictitious earthquake.  Students even get to choose the region for the earthquake!  Previously, I tried having students calculate the epicenter and magnitude of an earthquake, the old fashioned way, using printed seismograms, maps, nomograms and compasses.  Although, I like the idea of students doing everything by hand, the lab was VERY time consuming.  Finding the virtual seismologist site allowed me to cut the time of this lesson by half. 

In the past, I have used the Virtual Seismologist Activity a few different ways.  I have used it as a "Center", or independent activity that students have a week to complete on their own.  Typically for centers, I give students a few choices.  I decided that this activity was important for all students to complete, so I began using it in class.  There are four locations to choose from when executing a virtual earthquake.  As a class, we go through the first location together, using the Smart Board so that students can get an understanding for reading the seismograms, line graphs, and nomograms.  I always choose San Francisco, and then give students the choice of the other three earthquakes on the list.

First, we discuss what two important things seismologists are trying to find out when an earthquake strikes, epicenter and magnitude.  We then discuss how scientists must read seismograms from three different seismograph stations in order to determine the epicenter and magnitude of an earthquake.

I walk students through determining the S-P interval for each seismogram and allow them to come to the board for practice.

Next (this makes the math teachers happy!), we discuss reading a line graph and students come to the board to determine the distance of each station from the epicenter.

Students are excited when they see the circles intersecting, and they know that our work was correct!

Students typically struggle with understanding the Nomogram, so we go through it step by step as well.
They typically get confused when having to switch from reading the x-axis on the first set of seismograms, to reading the y axis.  This is a good spot for troubleshooting.

We take several minutes to talk about Nomograms, and The Richter Scale.  Again, students are excited when they see that our lines intersect, making it easy to see the magnitude in the center of the Nomogram.

Once I finish going through our example earthquake with the class, I turn students loose to work independently on "earning" their virtual seismologist certificates.  Most of the students are proud of these, and we display them in the hall and the classroom.

This activity is a great way to incorporate the real-world into the classroom, and doing it on-line saves a TON of time in class, opposed to using compasses and doing it the old fashioned way.  I have done it both ways, and I do not think that students are losing any knowledge or skills by doing it this way.