Monday 28 April 2008

The great soil race

We have just published another Earthlearningidea - Permeability of soils - 'The great soil race'. Soils are a precious resource on which we all ultimately depend for our food supply. Understanding the structure and nature of a soil can lead to better management techniques. Many pupils will be involved in agriculture or gardening at some stage of their lives, and, in rural areas, may well depend on it for their livelihoods.
This activity is great fun; try it with a clay-rich soil, a sandy soil and one with gravel or pebbles in it. Find out what your local soils are like. Do they absorb water or does it puddle on top or, maybe, it runs straight through? What can you do to improve it?
Please contact us with your thoughts and comments.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am highly appreciative of these valuable teaching aids related to Geoscience education. These Earthlearningideas are very nice and I hope that all the ideas are very useful to educate school children. The students can simply learn basics of Earth Science by experimenting with these ideas. However, as I am a University teacher, I think that some ideas are very simple and cannot be implemented for undergraduates. However, I have been reading all these ideas and have tried to develop some of the ideas to suit undergraduates.
Faculty of Applied Sciences, South Eastern University, Sri Lanka

Earth Learning Idea said...

Many thanks for this Ashvin and thank you for the excellent extension idea for 'The great soil race'. This has now been published with the activity on the website in the category 'Earth Materials'.