High School Students' Mnemonic Devices for Mohs Hardness Scale

Eleventh and twelfth grade students in five earth science classes made charts of mineral facts, mnemonic cartoon drawings, and corresponding poetry couplets for minerals on the Mohs scale of hardness. Students' products revealed they enjoyed the activity and learned many mineral concepts. The a...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of geoscience education 2006-01, Vol.54 (1), p.69-73
Main Authors: Harman, Pamela E., Rule, Audrey C.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Cartoons
Creativity
Earth Science
Geology
Grade 12
High School Students
Memory
Mnemonics
Opportunities
Poetry
Rhyme
Science activities
Scoring Rubrics
Secondary school students
Teaching Methods
Verbal Learning
Visualization
Citations: Items that cite this one
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Summary:Eleventh and twelfth grade students in five earth science classes made charts of mineral facts, mnemonic cartoon drawings, and corresponding poetry couplets for minerals on the Mohs scale of hardness. Students' products revealed they enjoyed the activity and learned many mineral concepts. The activity gave the instructor the opportunity to identify and correct several student misunderstandings. Many students displayed creativity in organizing their poems and drawings by a theme, using hardness numbers to represent two things in depictions, using homonyms, and incorporating humor in the cartoons. A rubric for evaluating student work addressed six aspects: correct mineral facts, mechanics of work, poem message, rhythm/rhyme, images, and creativity.
ISSN:1089-9995
2158-1428
DOI:10.5408/1089-9995-54.1.69