hands-on activity – Adventures in Oceanography and Teaching

Experiment: Ice cubes melting in fresh water and salt water

mglessmer — Mon, 23 Jul 2018 05:41:19 +0000

Explore how melting of ice cubes floating in water is influenced by the salinity of the water. Important oceanographic concepts like density and density driven currents are visualized and can be discussed on the basis of this experiment. Context Audience This hands-on experiment is suited for many different audiences and can be used to achieve a wealth […]

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Building a miniature well

mglessmer — Fri, 28 Nov 2014 12:54:23 +0000

Groundwater dynamics in the kitchen. This activity is suitable for young children who wonder where the tap water comes from. All you need is some sand, an empty toilet paper roll, and some water. First, you need to build your well. You could dig a hole into a sand-filled bucket and then put in the toilet paper […]

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Guest post: The mystery of the cold room

mglessmer — Wed, 30 Apr 2014 05:25:31 +0000

Guest post by Kristin Richter! Today I’m excited to bring to you a guest post from Innsbruck, Austria, written by my friend Kristin Richter. Kristin ran the oceanography lab in Bergen before I took over, and she is a total enabler when it comes to deciding between playing with water, ice and food dye, or doing “real” […]

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Fjord circulation

mglessmer — Fri, 01 Nov 2013 04:49:38 +0000

Tank experiment on a typical circulation in a fjord. Traditionally, a fjord circulation experiment has been done in GEOF130’s student practicals. Pierre and I recently met up to test-run the experiment before it will be run in this year’s course. This is the setup of the experiment: A long and narrow tank, filled with salt water, […]

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Progressive waves on a rope

mglessmer — Sat, 05 Oct 2013 03:55:52 +0000

Visualization of progressive waves: wave form and energy move forward while the rope itself stays in place. When I talked about waves in GEOF130 recently, in order to explain the concept of progressive waves, I showed a drawing from one of the textbooks, where someone was moving a rope such that waves traveled on the […]

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Measuring temperature.

mglessmer — Sat, 28 Sep 2013 03:20:17 +0000

Students build thermometers. As described in this post, I like to have students build “instruments” to measure the most oceanographic properties (temperature, salinity and density). I find that they appreciate oceanographic data much more once they have first-hand experience with how difficult it is to design instruments and make sense of the readings. Over the last […]

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Measuring salinity

mglessmer — Fri, 27 Sep 2013 03:17:46 +0000

Students evaporate water to measure the salinity of a water sample. As described in this post, I like to have students build “instruments” to measure the most oceanographic properties (temperature, salinity and density). I find that they appreciate oceanographic data much more once they have first-hand experience with how difficult it is to design instruments and […]

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Measuring density

mglessmer — Thu, 26 Sep 2013 04:09:58 +0000

Students build a device to measure density. As described in this post, I like to have students build “instruments” to measure the most oceanographic properties (temperature, salinity and density). I find that they appreciate oceanographic data much more once they have first-hand experience with how difficult it is to design instruments and make sense of […]

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Tasting sea water reloaded

mglessmer — Wed, 25 Sep 2013 03:46:33 +0000

Doing the “tasting sea water” activity again with a different group of students. A very good introduction to the concept of salinity is the “tasting sea water” activity. Last time I ran that activity, students were very quick to correctly connect the samples with the correct sampling locations without much discussion going on. This time […]

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Internal waves in a bottle

mglessmer — Wed, 18 Sep 2013 03:49:53 +0000

Internal waves are shown in simple 0.5l bottles. Waves travel on the interface between fluids of different densities and the phase speed of those waves depends on the density difference between the two fluids. The simplest way to demonstrate this in class can be seen below – two 0.5l plastic bottles are used, one half-filled […]

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