Students Study Volcanoes

Hosted by OSOS , contributed by echaniot on 21 June 2018

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Project Presentation

The “Students Study Volcanoes” accelerator focuses on the study of a physical phenomenon with great societal impact and proposes pedagogical practices based on inquiry‐based methods that are more effective in science education. The objective of this combination is on one hand to increase children’s and student’s interest in science, on how science is made and how it affects everyday life, and on the other to stimulate teacher motivation on up‐taking innovative teaching methods, subjects and practices to enrich and renew the science curriculum.

This accelerator aims to shed light in the mechanisms of volcano eruption, provide students and schools with educational scenarios employing state of the art simulations and remote labs which can be used to help forecast the possibility of a volcanic eruption and finally provide students with the means and methodology to raise awareness regarding volcanic dangers. This way, the students are trained to become sensitive and informed citizens, responsive to the needs of their local community, who will be able to understand and in the future manage crises in a consistent and minimum-risk fashion.

Information for the teacher:

This accelerator was created in the framework of the project - IDiverSE (Islands Diversity for Science Education - 2017-1-PT01-KA201-035919), co-financed by the Erasmus+ agency of the European Union).

Teachers are invited to explore it, copy it and edit whatever they feel necessary before they share it with their students. Specific guidelines were added to the four phases, where teachers can read the full content of the accelerator.

You can find more information as well as translation of this project to other languages through this link: https://idiverse.eu/students-study-volcanoes/

RRI Principles

One of the key aspects of OSOS is the inclusion of RRI - Responsible Research and Innovation - principles (more information at RRI-Tools.eu). This is how this accelerator fits in the RRI model:

Governance

Students will be able to share their activities and conclusions with different stakeholders at local, regional and national level using
a bottom up approach aiming to raise awareness regarding the impact of volcanoes in vulnerable societies.

I.e. : Students will organize open days to raise awareness for volcanoes in which they will invite stakeholders to participate and debate.

Public engagement

Different stakeholders will participate throughout the project in order to enrich the results obtained in their development.

In addition, students will be in contact with other OSOS Schools Participants, creating a network to exchange content around volcanology.

I.e.: students will contact families, neighbors and general public (to raise awareness about the dangers of volcanoes especially in areas of imminent danger) to or experts (to know the most technical details of these natural phenomena, organize lectures and monitor seismicity of volcanic areas), and will involve them in the project to improve their results.

Gender Equality

Natural disasters such as volcanic eruptions affect everybody equally, regardless of gender.

I.e.: Both genders will be equally represented throughout the project and students will investigate the effect volcanoes have on both women and men of the areas affected by volcanic eruptions.

Science Education

Students can develop changes and proposals to scientific policies around volcano monitoring, working on a series of conclusions that will have scientific value and can be used in the future. They will also work on real seismic data from volcanic areas such as Azores, which will help them understanding the problem.

I.e.: students, in collaboration with stakeholders involved in this Accelerator, will be able to work through the scientific method to know more about volcanoes, their consequences and the problems they pose for the society.

Ethics

Students will know how to manage real data and will be able to know the importance of working and experimenting with this type of information, reflecting on the need to provide full mechanisms for scientific research.

I.e.: when working with real volcanic data, students will value the integrity of these data and the importance of being responsible for its use, as well as for the conclusions and results extracted.

Open Access

Society in territories nearby a volcano need to live with constant fear of an eruption modify their lives around this reality, many times working with scientists in community based science projects to help prepare for a potential disaster. On the other hand, people who have no active volcanoes in their vicinity are not aware of the constant struggle of the first category of people and their constant danger and struggle. This Accelerator plays a very important role in disseminating intermediate results and conclusions to the public in order to: raise awareness, notify people away from volcanoes for the needs of those in constant danger and facilitate the possibility to contribute either by volunteering, or by sending food and other resources necessary. Students will be able to elaborate these materials and share them openly, and completely free of charge, to all those sectors that may be interested (such as general public, families as well as local, regional and national stakeholders).

I.e.: during this project, students can begin to raise what issues may be interesting to disseminate among the environment in order to, at the end of the activity, create the materials to disseminate, for example through leaflets or through the Internet.

Learning Objectives

Students will learn: The science behind volcano eruptions, the methodologies scientists use in order to monitor volcanoes and forecast volcano eruption probabilties, the connection between earthquakes and volcanoes.

Teacher: echaniot

Age group

9-12

12-15

15-18

18-25

Students participating

Feel

Addressed challenge:
This accelerator aims to shed light in the mechanisms of volcano eruption, provide students and schools with educational scenarios employing state of the art simulations and remote labs which can be used to help forecast the possibility of a volcanic eruption and finally provide students with the means and methodology to raise awareness regarding volcanic dangers. This way, the students are trained to become sensitive and informed citizens, responsive to the needs of their local community, who will be able to understand and in the future manage crises in a consistent and minimum-risk fashion.

Volcano eruptions can be identified as one of nature’s most spectacular and simultaneously hazardous phenomena. In more than 1500 places of our planet where tectonic plates diverge or converge, the ground will shake and hot molten rock will surface from the depths of the earth, exploding in a burst of heat, emiting fast moving hot ash, toxic gases and rock and of course hot lava which flows destroying everything in its passage.

Fig.1: Image from the explosion of the Kilauea volcano in Hawaii in May 22, 2018

^{Fig.1: Image from the explosion of the Kilauea volcano in Hawaii in May 22, 2018}

^{Fig.2: Lava from the Kilauea explosion expanding and destroying everything in its passage}

Humans residing in the vicinity of active volcanoes live in constant danger. Their lives and lifestyles are centered around the fact that they live near the clutches of an unpredictable sleeping giant. The reality of a hasty evacuation, the potential for loss of human and animal life, the destruction of property, the environmental disaster and loss of any conception of safety are hard facts that citizens of volcanically active territories face in a daily fashion.

^{Fig.3: In January 2018, More than 80,000 citizens of the Philippines had to leave their homes due to the threat of eruption of the Mayon Volcano}

^{Fig.4: Residents run away to escape from hot volcanic ash clouds engulfing villages in Karo district, Indonesia, during the eruption of Mount Sinabung volcano in February 2014. (Source: AFP)}

Can those who do not live in the conditions of constant danger really comprehend the daily struggle that local citizens face? Humans cannot switch nature on and off. However, science provides us with tools which can help us minimize loss in life, destruction of property, and environmental disaster. What is the role of scientists in the reality of a forthcoming volcano eruption? How can citizens organize themselves and prepare for such a phenomenon? What is the role that the school, a hub of knowledge transfer and openness, could play in order to help ensure the wellbeing of local society?
Is it possible to raise awareness of people living in safer conditions regarding the daily hazards that volcano-neighboring communities face?

Imagine

Background knowledge acquisition

-In this part of the project, students get the background information on volcanoes, volcanic eruption mechanisms and on the existing methodologies regarding the monitoring and forecasting of the probability of a volcanic eruption focusing on the connection between earthquake monitoring and volcano eruption forecasting. They will be able to interact with experts on the fields of geology and volcanology in dedicated invited sessions in their schools or visits, virtual or physical, to associated research centers.

_{Fig.5 Drones observe lava flow in real time}

The methods of forecasting the probability of a volcanic eruption include:

Monitoring of seismic activity.
Monitoring of thermal, magnetic, and hydrologic conditions.
Topographic monitoring of tilting or swelling of the volcano.
Monitoring of volcanic gas emissions.
Studying the geologic history of a particular volcano or volcanic centre

_{Fig.6 Methods of monitoring volcanic activity and forecasting volcanic eruptions}

_{Fig.7 Correlating earthquake activity with eruption probability. A potential scenario.}

- Students will analyze data from earlier volcanic eruptions and identify empirically the probability of a volcanic eruption based on evidence. Using these empirical data, they will run volcanic crisis management simulations utilizing available monitoring virtual tools to understand, in a hands-on fashion, the decision making process taking place in order to preserve human life during a volcanic crisis, while taking into account factors such as available budget and volcanic shelter healthcare conditions. Furthermore, students will utilize remote labs of seismic stations placed near volcanic regions and will be able to monitor in real time the earthquake activity near the volcanoes. (- Students will learn about the actions taken in countries with many active volcanoes such as Japan in order to issue warnings for volcanic activities to citizens.

https://www.jma.go.jp/jma/en/Activities/volcano_1.pdf
http://www.data.jma.go.jp/svd/vois/data/tokyo/STOCK/kaisetsu/English/level.html

_{Fig.8 Volcanic warning in Japan. (Source: https://www.jma.go.jp/en/volcano/ )}

Identifying the problem and imagining solutions

Having obtained the background on the volcano eruption mechanisms and the eruption probability forecasting methodologies, students imagine how their school can act as a volcano monitoring, active participating and raising awareness citizen science hub and create their action plan to implement it.
To facilitate the creation of their action plans, students will forge contact with volcano and geoscience research institutions. This project also foresees inter-school collaboration during which students of schools in the vicinity of a volcano will communicate with students from faraway locations in order to exchange experiences and practices.

Collaborating oversees

You can use the Restless Earth globallab project, to collaborate with other schools that are actively involved in the same project, build or use a seismograph, collect data, analyse it and compare with data collected by colleagues from other places of the world.

Create

A large number of activities will be organized by the participating schools, concerning volcano science and public engagement. The setting of priorities in the students’ activities will depend on their geo-location with respect to a volcano.

- Schools located in the vicinity of an active volcano
could prioritize higher the active participation in community monitoring of volcanoes through data taking, the offer of help in evacuation community drills, the organization of informing sessions on volcanoes for students and local citizens with the systematic collaboration with local volcano observatories among other activities.

- Schools located far from an active volcano
could participate in volcano monitoring using remote labs, organize workshops in their school for the local community with presentations of their own and of invited speakers regarding volcano hazards and raise awareness through dedicated campaigns. They could organize virtual visits to volcano sites with the cooperation of schools in the vicinity of an active volcano.

_{Fig.9 Primary school students connect virtually and discuss with a volcanologist}

_{Fig.10 Students organize visits to inactive volcanoes and understand the environmental impact of a volcano eruption to the local and global ecosystem. (Source: http://www.volcano-erasmusplus.eu/2016/12/04/turkish-students-visited-the-inactive-volcano-in-kula/)}

_{Fig.11 Students prepare an exhibition to explain volcano science to the public and their classmates.}

_{Fig.12 Students visit dedicated science centers on volcano science (http://www.volcano-erasmusplus.eu/2016/06/13/the-excursion-of-polish-students-to-the-land-of-extinct-volcanoes/ )}

_{Fig.13 Students in volcanic areas fly drones and get real footage of the volcano activity}

_{Fig.14 Analyzing earthquake data to monitor volcanic activity}

_{Fig.15 Getting in contact with volcano research institutions}

_{Fig.16 Supporting evacuees affected by volcano eruptions (http://josephfeeding.org/disaster-relief/mayon-relief-outreach-taladong-evacuation-center/ ).}

_{Fig.17 Estimating danger and creating flyers with guidelines for travelers in areas with active volcanoes (Source: http://www.med-suv.eu )}

Students will keep an interactive logbook with which they collect material, notes, multimedia resources and also keep the minutes of their virtual meetings with other schools, experts and local stakeholders. By the end of the activity, students will compile their notes from the logbooks and create an informative video highlighting the course of their project.

At a later stage of the project, students could create a more permanent student-centered non profit company, aiming to monitor volcano activity, raise awareness and help in attempts for relief of citizens living in volcanic areas.

You can use the Restless Earth globallab project, to collaborate with other schools that are actively involved in the same project. Τhis project has been created by Eleftheria Tsourlidaki on behalf of Ellinogermaniki Agogi.