Natural Cities Lesson 4
Overview
This lesson provides an opportunity for students to apply foundational
ecological and geological concepts to investigate the natural history
of their own local environment. Using field investigation and research
skills, they are able to “dig beneath the surface” (literally) to uncover how
the land was formed, why its current inhabitants are able to live there
and why the land can support its current human uses..
Objectives
Students will:
• Use open inquiry, field observations, controlled investigations
and research to support their own interpretations of the
geological and ecological history of their local environment.
• Create and defend their findings through a public presentation
that incorporates their research and conclusions. Materials and Resources
Dependent on student needs.
• A variety of teacher-generated readings on local geology.
• Geology lab resources such as stream tables if possible. • Presentation materials that best fit your available resources (for
example, posters, Prezi presentation, research paper).
• Research and presentations will be enhanced with access to the
Internet. Be sure to use any scholarly databases your district
might subscribe to (such as EBSCO), though other options like
Google Scholar work well. Setting
High School Campus, Local Park or Nearby Natural Area
A Natural
History of our
Local Park:
Geology and
Ecological
Succession
By Johnny Devine
SUBJECTS
Biology
Geology
Earth Science
Urban Ecology
Physical
Environment
Time Needed
1 to 2 days for preparation, 3 to 6 class periods for teaching 5 lessons
Glossary Terms:
Weathering
Erosion
Glaciations
Sediment
Grain-size
Ecological succession
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Background Information
This unit was designed as a means for students to apply the scientific process and open inquiry to
geology and ecology. Students are told that every rock and landscape has a story to tell; we just
need to know how to hear it. The idea is for students to expand their perspective on the world, to
move from seeing the strip mall, to seeing the hill that the mall is on, to asking how is it that that hill
came to be here.
This activity begins with a question: What is the natural history of our local environment? The
ecology and geology are trying to tell us a story that goes back millions of years. Students use
this guiding question to focus their observations. These observations are then used to create a
hypothesis about our area’s past. Students design controlled scientific investigations to generate
data that supports their hypothesis, and they use research from the larger scientific community to
strengthen their argument.
In the final presentation part of this activity, students must defend their interpretation of our area’s
past. They practice making solid, evidence-based scientific arguments and participate in a scientific
community.
Urban Relevance
Students begin to discover that the very ground under their feet has a story to tell and science is
the means to discovering that story. They gain perspective on their urban environment, realizing
that it has changed through a series of natural and human-made processes. This lesson provides an
opportunity for students to explore science concepts such as geology and ecology inside the city as
opposed to having to travel to a more rural area. This is important as it emphasizes that cities are not
places where nature stops working, even though it may not be as easy to see. Students may gain a
new perspective of a field science career path that does not have to take them far away.
Procedure
Preparation
Familiarize yourself with the geology and ecology of your local environment before your students
begin this activity. Use the Internet or your library to discover what resources and information
students are likely to encounter as they conduct their investigation. What is the accepted history of
your area according to professional geologists and ecologists? What are major human impacts that
are likely to arise during your students’ investigations?
1. Ask students how they think urban development impacts geology and ecological
succession. Students answer this in their journal or science notebook and discuss it in small
groups before sharing their thoughts in a class discussion.
2. Make sure students have some basic background information about ecology and geology.
The terms in the glossary should be well understood by the time this lesson happens and are
included for review purposes. A methodology for teaching these concepts is not included
here. It is assumed that these topics have been thoroughly covered and that students have
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communicated mastery of them. Based on their own knowledge and research of the local
environment, the teacher should design some classroom activities that will re-introduce
students to important terminology they may want to use when observing nature. For
example, I re-introduce the ideas of weathering, erosion, glaciations, sediments, and grainsize before taking my students out to observe an exposed cliff band. Don’t lecture students
about what they are going to find! Let them generate questions and make their own
observations and arguments. Similarly, you would want to introduce concepts related to
ecology and ecological succession (what types of species are present, what does the pH of
the soil tell us, what type of density do we observe in the vegetation, what are the age and
size of key plants, how does the canopy relate to the understory, etc.).
3.Take students to a nearby location where they can see some native species in as
undeveloped an area as possible. Be careful of overly developed city parks that may be
relatively young and full of nonnative species.
4.Provide students with some examples of questions to ask about the ecology and geology
that they observe. Students should be able to return to class with a collection of questions
that they can investigate/research. (see attached document “Geology Observations.” You
could prepare a similar guide for the biological aspects of the environment).
© Dan Strauss/The Nature Conservancy
5.Back in the classroom provide students with targeted resources (reading, Internet sites,
library books) that will help direct them down the correct path as they attempt to answer
the questions they generated in the park.
6.Lead students through an activity that will help them create one or more educated guesses
about the local environment’s history. For example, a good educated guess could be, “I
think that at one time, rivers deposited the sediments that now make up the rocks in our
park, because I found
poorly sorted, rounded
grains in the exposed cliff
band.” Students should
create a similar guess
about the ecology, such
as, “The area of the park
that we observed is in an
early stage of ecological
succession because of
the presence of species
X, the low pH in the soil
and the thin cover of soil.”
Their educated guess
should include room for
a controlled scientific
investigation, such as
using a stream table to
Outcroppings can often be seen in urban parks.
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© Dan Strauss/The Nature Conservancy
observe how rivers deposit sediments,
or using soil pH probes to investigate
the chemistry of different types of
environments.
7.Do some front loading for students
about what their final presentation
must accomplish. Create and provide a
rubric that meets your needs. You will
be providing students time to conduct
research and investigations that will
add evidence to their claims about
the area’s past; it’s really important
that they know how much time they
Sites of park maintenance are often great spots to see beneath the surface.
have. This is a great time to talk
about constraints, validity and scientific argumentation. Depending on your modifications,
students should support their claim with at least one data-centered investigation and a
minimal amount of research. Some students will try to do too little work and some may try
to do too much; it’s your job as the teacher to coach them along to the optimal amount.
8. Guide students through an open inquiry process where they design at least one controlled
scientific investigation that will add data-based evidence to their educated guess about the
local environment’s past. They may need to modify their story about the geology or ecology
as they work through their experiment. Examples of investigations mentioned above
included using stream tables to investigate weathering and erosion rates. Students could
also conduct data-generating investigations that don’t involve a controlled variable but still
help support their story, such as measuring the density of certain trees or comparing tree
size to tree age.
9. Guide students through a research process. This requires some front loading and
structuring, depending on the abilities of your students and the time you have available.
The end goal is that students have information and/or data from other scientists that they
can correctly cite and use to support their own interpretation of the local environment’s
past. Students may want to modify their own interpretation of the area’s past as they read
information from other scientists, but it’s important that they don’t abandon their own
thinking. You could scaffold this activity by providing a limited number of readings, books
or internet sites that are appropriate for the reading level of your students and do not
wander too far from the reality of your area’s past.
10. Provide groups time to discuss questions/hypotheses to share their answers. This allows
students to practice their presentation/communication skills and receive feedback from
their peers.
11. Finally, students should present and defend their interpretation of the area’s geological and
ecological past in a format that makes the most sense for your time and resources. Their
presentation should be a scientific argument that uses evidence from their investigations
and cites other scholarly information from their research. My students prepared large
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posters as part of their presentations, but other visual aids could be used, such as creating
a website or preparing a Prezi presentation. Peer evaluation was a big part of my class, so
I had students evaluate the soundness of other students’ arguments. Presenters had to
respond to these critiques.
Assessment
© Dan Strauss/The Nature Conservancy
It is important to chunk and scaffold this project so
that students receive critical feedback at all steps
along the way. Be sure to assess students’ work
during observations, background lessons, research
and final presentation. Do not wait until the final
presentation to give your students a grade! The
final presentation was the largest portion of my
students’ overall grade for this project, but they
had received enough intermediate feedback that
most students were very successful with their final
products.
Some parks, like Prospect Park in Brooklyn, NY, have signage
to help visitors learn a little geology.
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Natural History of Your Local Park
Geology observations
SAFETY – Your actions and words must promote the safety of yourself and others. Loss of privilege
or reduction in grade may result from a violation of this prime expectation.
OBJECTIVE – You are to take observations of geology in the park and generate questions to
investigate back in the classroom. You must write in your journal and use an effective organization
scheme.
ASSESSMENT – You will be assessed on how well you organize your notes in your journal. Be sure
to include headings for any new notes and include the location (a description and latitude and
longitude) of any observations.
OBSERVATIONS – Address these points, using an organizational scheme that you think is most
effective.
• What types of rock do we find in the park?
• What types of sediment do we find in the park?
• What evidence is there to determine how these sediments were deposited?
• What are the grain sizes and textures of sediments we find?
• Are the sediments well sorted or poorly sorted?
• What are examples of transportation and erosion that you see?
• Which of Steno’s Principles do we see in the park? [In 1669, Nicolaus Steno (1638-1686) formulated a few basic rules that helped him make sense of
rocks and the various objects contained within them. His short preliminary work, De Solido Intra
Solidum Naturaliter Contento — Dissertationis Prodromus (Provisional report on solid bodies
naturally embedded in other solids), included several propositions that have since become
fundamental to geologists studying all kinds of rocks. Three of these are known as Steno’s Principles,
and a fourth observation, on crystals, is known as Steno’s Law. More on Steno’s Principles can be
found in geology textbooks and on the Internet. (Source: About.com/Geology)
QUESTIONS – Record in your notes at least three questions that you would like to investigate. For
example, some questions may be similar to these (you may use one of these as a question you would
like to investigate):
• What areas of the park have been altered by humans, possibly disrupting the geology?
• I found a layer of sediment with grain size of up to 5 cm. What kind of transportation media
could move grains that size?
• I found a layer of sediment with a number of round pebbles. How did these pebbles get
round?
• I found a sedimentary layer with other rocks in it. Are these rocks igneous, metamorphic or
sedimentary?
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Natural History of Your Local Park
Geologic column
SAFETY – Your actions and words must promote the safety of yourself and others. Loss of privilege
or reduction in grade may result from a violation of this prime expectation.
OBJECTIVE – You will create a geologic column of the park based on the outcrops we observe. You
need at least three distinct layers. For each layer you should describe the sorting (poor, well, etc.),
largest grain size (microscopic, 5 cm, etc.), texture of grains (angular or rounded), color and thickness.
These should be approximations based on your visual observations.
ASSESSMENT – You will be assessed on how well you organize your notes in your journal. Be sure to
include headings for any new notes and include the location of any observations.
Example:
Top Layer
Poorly sorted
Angular grains
Light color
Pebbles up to 5cm
30 feet thick
Second Layer
Better sorted than top layer
Rounded grains
Light color with dark pebbles
Occasional grain up to 2cm
20 feet thick
Bottom Layer
Grain texture not visible
Very well sorted
Dark green/brown
Fine grain
10 feet thick
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S U B M I T T E D
B Y
T H E N E W YO R K B OTA N I C A L G A R D E N
Bronx, New York
Through comprehensive education programs, the
New York Botanical Garden’s Children’s Education
Department seeks to engage children and their
families and enhance the skills and knowledge
of students and teachers in science,
gardening and nature exploration.
www.nybg.org/edu