Earth, Sea, Space Workshop

OASST instructor, Liz, helps phase II DO-IT scholar, Mikayla, measure the beak of a bird to help identify what type of bird it is.

Phase II Scholars Nolan, Alex, Lindsay, Peter, and Mikayla participated in the Our Environment! Earth, Sea, and Space workshop. Each day held a different topic of study. On Monday, we focused on weather and climate, which included running a simple climate model on our laptops. On Tuesday, we explored concepts in oceanography and global warming with an oceanographer from the Polar Science Center. One cool experiment was to determine water level changes by melting ice in water.

Wednesday involved earth and space science. Through one experiment we charted the rate of speed of avalanches, icebergs, and mudflows. By allowing liquid nitrogen to build up pressure in a water bottle that was taped to a cylinder block and placed in a plastic garbage can, we were able to observe this explosion.

Our last day involved seabirds and marine ecology through the Coastal Observation and Seabird Survey Team program. After learning about ecology, using wings, feet, and beaks, we were able to identify sea birds using a field guide.