Updated July 2016
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PhET Interactive Simulations: Earth Science

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Solid simulations are more illuminating than textbook diagrams

Subjects & skills
Subjects
  • Science
Skills
  • Critical Thinking
Grades This grade range is a recommendation by Common Sense Education and not the developer/publisher.
1–12
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Price:  Free
Platforms:  Website

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How Can I Teach with This Tool?

PhET's excellent simulations, which let students visualize and take an active role in controlling complex scientific phenomena, have a place in earth science classes and units across the K-12 spectrum. From illustrating astronomy and gravity to demonstrating fluid dynamics and material properties (to more concrete phenomena such as glaciers, plate tectonics, and the greenhouse effect), there's almost certainly a simulation that will fit into your lessons.

Before turning to videos and diagrams to show off earth sciences, it's worth checking out PhET for a more dynamic experience. Let students get their hands on these and they'll quickly internalize tricky concepts. If you need some ideas, check out the teacher-prepared lesson plans, labs, and guides that accompany each simulation. 

 

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Standards:

Key Standards Supported

Earth’s Place in the Universe

  • 1-ESS1-1

    Use observations of the sun, moon, and stars to describe patterns that can be predicted.

  • 2-ESS1-1

    Use information from several sources to provide evidence that Earth events can occur quickly or slowly.

  • 4-ESS1-1

    Identify evidence from patterns in rock formations and fossils in rock layers to support an explanation for changes in a landscape over time.

  • MS-ESS1-1

    Develop and use a model of the Earth-sun-moon system to describe the cyclic patterns of lunar phases, eclipses of the sun and moon, and seasons.

  • MS-ESS1-2

    Develop and use a model to describe the role of gravity in the motions within galaxies and the solar system.

  • HS-ESS1-4

    Use mathematical or computational representations to predict the motion of orbiting objects in the solar system.

  • HS-ESS1-5

    Evaluate evidence of the past and current movements of continental and oceanic crust and the theory of plate tectonics to explain the ages of crustal rocks.

Earth’s Systems

  • 4-ESS2-1

    Make observations and/or measurements to provide evidence of the effects of weathering or the rate of erosion by water, ice, wind, or vegetation.

  • MS-ESS2-2

    Construct an explanation based on evidence for how geoscience processes have changed Earth’s surface at varying time and spatial scales.

Matter and Its Interactions

  • MS-PS1-4

    Develop a model that predicts and describes changes in particle motion, temperature, and state of a pure substance when thermal energy is added or removed.

Motion and Stability: Forces and Interactions

  • 3-PS2-2

    Make observations and/or measurements of an object’s motion to provide evidence that a pattern can be used to predict future motion.

Waves and Their Applications in Technologies for Information Transfer

  • 1-PS4-1

    Plan and conduct investigations to provide evidence that vibrating materials can make sound and that sound can make materials vibrate.

  • 1-PS4-2

    Make observations to construct an evidence-based account that objects can be seen only when illuminated.

  • 1-PS4-3

    Plan and conduct an investigation to determine the effect of placing objects made with different materials in the path of a beam of light.

  • 4-PS4-1

    Develop a model of waves to describe patterns in terms of amplitude and wavelength and that waves can cause objects to move.

  • 4-PS4-2

    Develop a model to describe that light reflecting from objects and entering the eye allows objects to be seen.

  • MS-PS4-1

    Use mathematical representations to describe a simple model for waves that includes how the amplitude of a wave is related to the energy in a wave.

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