2016 Intermountain GIS Conference

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are used within a wide variety of professional communities to solve a vast range of spatial questions. While the complexity of these systems has historically limited their use to specialists, today just about everyone uses GIS. Examples ranging from onboard car and cell phone navigation systems to google maps and the daily weather forecast highlight how prevalent the technology has become in our day-to-day lives and demonstrate the ability of the technology to convey information quickly and efficiently. Despite the prevalence of GIS and its ability to answer questions and convey information, few K-12 schools teach or use GIS as a teaching tool.
As a teaching tool, GIS can be used to not only teach basic geography but can aid and enhance skills in reading, writing, math, science, problem solving, public speaking, computers, spatial thinking, data manipulation, and computer programming. At Frenchtown Elementary we have embarked on a project that uses GIS to aid in teaching. Through a detailed lesson plan and multiple exercises that use a GIS to answer spatial questions, students learn problem solving skills and how those skills can be used to find treasure in the treasure state.
Come join us on our treasure hunt as our students show their findings! Over the course of the project they have used GIS to map locations of gold mines in the 9 Mile Watershed, and they have created predictive maps of undiscovered gold using resource layers such as streams, vegetation types, and elevation. Along the way they have learned about the different methods that were historically used to extract gold, discuss whether or not those methods used 150 years ago still have an effect on water quality today, and have designed a spatially explicit science experiment to test this question. Their study design includes sampling water quality upstream and downstream of 3 gold mine sites in the 9 Mile Watershed. To get to those locations they will try out their newly honed orienteering skills using traditional compass and pacing and will learn about GPS technology. While navigating to their sample sites they will learn about map accuracy and determine the accuracy of their “Map of Undiscovered Gold” by panning for gold. Back in the classroom, students will be testing their water samples, evaluating the results, and determining whether or not heavy metals are still present in the 9 Mile Watershed. Through facilitated experiments and discussion, they are “discovering” that the greatest treasures in the Treasure State include not only shiny minerals like gold but also resources like clean water.