Learning to read and interpret topographic maps is a common (but difficult-to-teach) skill in most introductory geoscience courses. In this issue, there are two papers that describe creative approaches to teaching topography. Cockrell and Petcovic describe a simple innovation that could be incorporated into many standard labs: creating a 3D printed tile that matches a contour-line map used during lab. Now that 3D printing has become widely available, it is possible to make a physical model of whatever location you like (including your local area), with the same horizontal scale as your paper maps. This innovation has potential for teaching visually impaired students, as well as sighted students. Another option for teaching topography is to use an augmented reality sandbox, in which typical topographic map information (contours and colors) is projected onto sand, which can be manipulated by students. Johnson and McNeal developed a series of activities in which students were first given paper maps, then manipulated the sand to match them, and tested whether the approach developed students’ spatial thinking skills (mental rotation, spatial orientation, and spatial visualization).
Learning about groundwater is difficult for other reasons: groundwater is hidden. Two research articles discuss challenges to teaching groundwater. White, Lally, and Forbes studied how K-12 students relate a computer-based modeling tool to concepts, and found that although students recognized wells, they had a hard time understanding topographic contours, ground elevations, water table elevations, and groundwater flow. Arthurs and Kowalski tested an approach to helping students in introductory college courses change their conceptions of where non-karst groundwater resides (e.g., in pore spaces and cracks, as opposed to in underground lakes and rivers). They found that talking explicitly about the students’ preconceptions resulted in even more learning gains than active learning alone did.
Other papers in the issue address challenges for mixtures of advanced and introductory courses. Johnson, Adams, and Antonenko used interactive numerical models (GEOAppS) to help students in an upper level coastal processes course improve their quantitative skills. Turk and Young developed and tested an approach to teaching estimation of soil texture (sand, silt, and clay content) by calibrating themselves using samples of known texture. Schoenbohm and McMillan developed a team-based capstone project in which students integrate concepts from many different geology courses as they come up with their own tectonically plausible imaginary planets, complete with geologic histories. Davi, Pringle, Fiondella, Lockwood, and Oelkers have developed online tree-ring labs to introduce students to the use of dendrochronology in climate change studies. Finally, Gregory, Tomes, Pansiuk, and Andersen describe an online field course that they developed in 2020, in response to COVID lockdowns.
Finally, for faculty who are feeling worn down by the prospect of teaching online as new COVID variants continue be recognized, in 2017 (when online classes were an option rather than a public health measure), Ramirez, Tetten, Mamo, Speth, Kettler, and Sindelar studied student perceptions and performance in traditional, flipped (online with a 2-hour face-to-face lab), and online courses. They found that students in the flipped and online courses performed as well on the final exam as students in the face-to-face class, and were equally likely to feel that the course met its objectives. The greatest influence on student engagement and performance was the students’ year in college: second-year undergraduates were less satisfied and engaged than first-year, third-year, or fourth-year students.