Description
This activity has been designed as a way to access a learning groups prior knowledge of and experiences with seismology, while introducing the participants to one another.
Audience
Grades 5 to 12
Supporting Resources
The activity is available as a .doc file or as a .pdf file.
Introductory Activity
Instructions: This activity is designed to introduce the participants to one another and to the workshop presenters and to investigate some facts about earthquakes and how earthquakes have affected people in the group. If possible, find a different person to answer each of the questions given below. Briefly interview as many participants as you can (who they are and ask them if they can answer any of the questions). Your aim is to find a person who can answer each of the questions. Once you have,write the person’s name in the space provided and their answer to the question.
1. Someone who has stood on a major fault:_________________ Name of fault:_________________
2. Someone who has felt the shaking of the ground or a building during an earthquake:__________________
3. Someone who has personally observed damage from and earthquake:_______________
4. Someone who can name 3 kinds of tectonic plate boundaries: _______________ Name of boundaries: _____________, _______________, ______________
5. Someone who knows where the New Madrid seismic zone is:______________ Location of the New Madrid seismic zone___________________
6. Someone who can name the theory developed by H. Reid to help explain the 1906 earthquake data: ______________Name of theory: ________________________
7. Someone who can name three types of seismic waves:________________ Names of three types of waves:______________, ____________, _______________
8. Someone who can tell you how many magnitude 8+ earthquakes occur in the world each year: _____________ How many? ____________
9. Someone who can tell you when and when the largest historic earthquake occurred in the US:______________ Where: ____________ When: __________
10. Someone who can name a magnitude scale which is now used more widely than the Richter scale to describe the size of an earthquake: ________________ Name of magnitude scale: _____________________
