Most people are familiar with Shel Silverstein's poem "Where the Sidewalk Ends", but do they know where and why sidewalks crack? It's a valid and worthy question, and this handy educational activity from Charles Onasch of Bowling Green State University explains just that. Here, students will learn to use fractures in sidewalks as an analog for natural outcrops and also learn how to make systematic...

Understanding certain aspects of structural geology can be challenging for undergraduates, and the good people at "On the Cutting Edge" have worked to create this useful resource to help students and educators. This particular lesson plan was created by Paul Kelso of Lake Superior State University, and it was designed for students who have a bit of background knowledge of structural geology. The...

The geology teaching resources offered by the professional development initiative at Carleton College are uniformly quite strong, and this particular pedagogical resource is no different. Created by Professor Robert Burger at Smith College, this activity "is based on Quick Time movies and color digital photographs derived from sandbox experiments that produce normal faults in a variety of boundary...

The Teaching Structural Geology in the 21st Century website from Carleton College brings together lesson plans, interactive modules, and in-class evaluations that help college professors work more effectively with their students. This recent addition to the site comes from H. Robert Burger of Smith College. This activity is based on a series of Quick Time movies and color digital photographs, and...

Conveying the dynamism of various geologic processes can be hard in the classroom or on the web, but this interactive feature from the Annenberg Media's Learner.org site does quite a fine job of introducing students to plate tectonics, plate boundaries, and such perennial favorites as earthquakes and volcanoes. In the "Earth's Structure" section, visitors can roll the mouse over such features as...

The teaching and research program, Structural Geology and Geomechanics at Stanford University, concentrates on brittle deformation in the earth's crust as well as fracturing and faulting of rocks under ductile conditions. Researchers can learn about the group's research which effectively unites field observations, laboratory experiments, and theoretical modeling. Scientists can learn about the...

The Cutting Edge group at Carleton College has created a number of fine teaching resources for college-level instructors working across the geological sciences, and this website is no exception. This particular area of their larger site is primarily intended for educators who teach structural geology. As visitors scroll through the site, they will find thematic areas that include links to computer...

The Structural Geology Resources Collection at Carleton College presents a wide cornucopia of material, and this latest addition adds another new facet to their collection. These two new resources utilize Google Earth in order to help college students learn about geologic map interpretation, and they were created by Barbara Tewskbury at Hamilton College and Charlie Onasch at Bowling Green State...

To some, the terms folds, faults, and shear zones might suggest a type of elaborate and cutting-edge style of origami. Those in the know will think immediately of the field of structural geology, and this site is a fine resource for information within that area of geology. Rob Butler, Martin Casey, Geoff Lloyd, and Andrew McCaig, all of whom work in the School of Earth Sciences at the University...

The Online Guide to Sequence Stratigraphy created by the University of Georgia addresses the relevance of sequence stratigraphy on outcrops. With a series of helpful figures and great images, students and educators can learn about parasequences, stacking patterns, chronostratigraphy, and much more. The glossary assists users with the terminology used within the materials. For those interested in...