Structural Geology Worksheet

[Miss Ruhnke]

Onthis trip, students practice doing geology in the field, and along the way decipher the long tectonic history of the Appalachian Mountains. Students worked in teams of three and gave themselves a slew of clever team names, including Team Hammer Time, Team Pomi-Granites, the Cambrian Crew, and Team Easy Breezy Boudinage (just to name a few). When we arrive at an outcrop, the students eagerly debouch from the vans, and I hand out worksheets filled with an array of geologic questions. Teams work through the questions: observing the rocks and measuring geologic structures. After the work is complete, I collect the worksheets and we discuss our answers and then try to place the local outcrop into a broader regional tectonic framework.

So based on this simple calculation, deformation in the Garth Run high-strain zone may well have taken place in about a million years. A long time from a human perspective, but in the realm of geologic collisions between continent-sized blocks, just a brief skirmish across a long front.

We finished our work at Garth Run, and made our way to camp at the base of the Blue Ridge Mountains (also in the granitic basement complex). After the sun set the wind abated and stars appeared, however it was going to be a cold night. By morning a hard freeze was upon us, and the temperature bottomed out at -3 C (27 F). Needless to say, there were quite a few cold W&M geologists- eager for hot drinks, hard boiled eggs, and toasted bagels.

Stephen J. Reynolds: Arizona GeologyThis web site of Steve Reynolds, geology professor at Arizona State University, contains numerous color photographs, 3D perspectives, and information about the Geology of Arizona, Landscapes of the Southwest, structural geology, science-education reform, and using Bryce5 to illustrate geology (like the image above).

NOTE (3/2020): We recreated the Visualizing Topography site and Interactive Geologic Blocks websites as html5-compatible versions, with all movies being mp4 files that will run on students phone, tablets, and comptuers (we had to do this when Apple saddly ditched the QTVR capabilities in QuickTime). These modules are less interactive than the QuickTime versions, which are listed on the links to the left side and which run fine if you use QuickTime 7. The links to the new versions of the odules and the corresponding worksheets are provided in the links below. We are advertising these now because so many of us are having to shift labs to remote-access modes.

The sites listed to the left illustrate various aspects of geology, especially visualizing geology in 3D. The sites use QuickTime Virtual Reality (QTVR) Movies, including QTVR Object Movies, in which you can spin and tilt an object as if you were holding it in your hand, and QTVR Panorama Movies, in which you scroll, pan, or pivot around to get different views around you. Hover the mouse over each button to the left to see a description of the site. Many of the sites contain big movies (some over 10 MB), but I try to warn you in advance.

Virtual worlds, field trips, and other virtualreality files -- This link is the best place to begin to prowl my site; it will lead to links to some of my coolest stuff. If you have participated in one of my NAGTDistinguished Speaker sessions or want to see the materials developed as part of the NSF-funded Hidden Earth and Hidden Earth Curriculum Projects, this is the place!

Featured link -- Strike and Dip QuickTime VR Movie. Tilt and spin a wooden plank, with a strike and dip symbol, in a barrel of water, created by Julia Johnson and me. Warning -- File is 2 Mb and takes time to download.

Stereonet 3D --Stereonet 3D is not yet a full-blown website, but is for now two QuickTime VR movies of a lower-hemisphere with a plane and its pole. Drag the curser sideways to change the strike and up-down to change the dip. The movies are designed to let students explore freely where planes of different orientationand their poles plot on a stereonet. These movies gofrom 15 to 60 degrees dip, but I plan to make more and move them into their ownwebsite. There is a small version (320X240 pixels; 570K) and a larger version (640 X480; 1.5 MB).

Our destination for this digital trip is Hidden Rock Park near Goochland. This former landfill was turned into a county park in the late 1990s. As the site was graded to construct baseball and softball fields, large expanses of the bedrock were exposed. Bedrock outcrops are far and few between in the eastern Piedmont and Hidden Rock Park serves as an important destination for William & Mary Geology field trips.

Some of the foliation seem to be folded which gives insight to its deformation. In the fourth picture after the worksheet, these folds seem to be nearly recumbent with an angular hinge and a tight interlimb angle. Additionally, the features at point X are known as boudins. The pictures for these past trips look great! I hope one day I can visit this outcrop.

As an ES&D alum, I found this field trip to not only be an epic bonding experience, but invaluable field practice. Applying classroom material in the field is incredibly difficult! Practicing these skills in the field, failing, and trying again is what makes geology glorious.

Woohoo! Boudins and foliation galore! Using the 5(?ish?) picture with the 40 cm hammer I calculated an x axis of approx. 40 cm and y of approx. 15 cm leading to a strain ratio of 2.67, closest to the worksheet estimate R(s) = 2.

I would describe the strain ellipse as having an X axis 40 cm long tilted about 10 degrees east of north and a perpendicular Z axis 15 cm in length.

This trip really would have been a blast. The stoke factor peaks in the field, truly.

The outcrops at Hidden Rock Park appear to have folded rock, cross cut by a granitic dike, which was later tightly folded and boudinaged. The boudins present are of many different sizes. It is clear that there was definitely extensive deformation as well as metamorphism at this outcrop.

The undergraduate Bachelor of Science degree in Geology is a rigorous program that is designed to both prepare students for entry into the workforce as practicing geoscientists, and to provide them with the knowledge required to pursue an advanced degree. Students enrolled in the Geology program are afforded the opportunity to pursue interests in several areas of specialization, including: petrology, volcanology, structural geology, sedimentary geology, economic geology, hydrology, soil science, climate change, petroleum geology, and paleontology. A critical component of this degree program is a field-based capstone project in which students must demonstrate their ability to interpret a natural system and communicate their understanding in a professional manner.

Geoscience is an all-encompassing term used to refer to the earth sciences. The Department of Geosciences offers programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels where students can learn about topics such as earth processes; the origin and evolution of our planet; the chemical and physical properties of minerals, rocks, and fluids; the structure of our mobile crust; the history of life; and the human adaptation to earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides, and floods.

The School of Life Sciences offers programs that meet the needs of students intending to enter the workforce or pursue advanced training in the sciences, medicine, and other professional and technical fields. We provide a well-rounded foundation in natural, physical, and mathematical sciences that can set students up for successful careers and professional programs.

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See the fact file below for more information about Geology, or you can download our comprehensive worksheet pack to utilize within the classroom or home environment.

Stratigraphers evaluate samples of stratigraphic segments that can be retrieved from the field, such as drill cores, in the laboratory. Stratigraphers also examine geophysical survey data to determine the positions of stratigraphic units in the subsurface.

Avalanches, earthquakes, flooding, landslides, debris flows, river channel migration and avulsion, rockfalls, sinkholes, and soil liquefaction are significant natural hazards relevant to geology (as opposed to those primarily or only applicable to meteorology), subsidence, tsunamis, and volcanic eruptions.

These worksheets have been specifically designed for use with any international curriculum. You can use these worksheets as-is, or edit them using Google Slides to make them more specific to your own student ability levels and curriculum standards.

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Integrating the applications of geodesy into the secondary and undergraduate curriculum broadens students' exposure to modern measurement techniques such as global positioning system (GPS), airborne or terrestrial lidar (TLS), and gravity. Scientists use geodesy as an approach to understand the changing face of our planet to study plate motion, sea level changes, Earthquakes, glacial movement and isostatic changes, volcanic deformation, landslides, glaciers, vegetation change, subsidence, soil moisture, precipitable water vapor, the water cycle, and more.

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