In May WA-DNR released a new educational web guide that helps students of all ages prepare for volcano hazards and learn more about these natural phenomena. Take a look and send your feedback: geology@dnr.wa.gov
They partnered with some of Washington’s regional science coordinators to create this product, and with their help hosted a Zoom professional development session (Have a Blast! Volcano Science with the Washington Geological Survey) with K-12 teachers across the state on the morning of Saturday, May 22nd.
Teachers earned 6 STEM clock hours and a small stipend for participating in our class. The class was broken into three sessions. The first 2 hours of the session were for asynchronous work, where the teachers worked through the web guide themselves. The teachers submitted feedback regarding their experiences with our web guide, the usability of our guide, and whether the content was appropriate for their students.
The second 2 hours of the session involved a Zoom call which sought teacher feedback on the guide and discussed how the guide could be adapted to fit various student’s needs, and also answered questions the teachers asked about volcanoes and earth science more broadly, and the teachers filled out this fun word cloud:
The final 2 hours of the session were for more asynchronous work, where teachers summarized their learning about volcanoes and created their Community Hazards Plan capstone projects. If you are a student or a teacher you can email feedback to DNR on this project at: geology@dnr.wa.gov