DUE0127191: Development of a 3D Interactive Mineralogy Textbook Mineralogy and Optical Mineralogy M'

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DUE-0127191 Development of a 3-D Interactive
Mineralogy TextbookMineralogy and Optical
MineralogyM. Darby Dyar1, Mickey E. Gunter2,
Dennis Tasa31Dept. of Astronomy, Mount Holyoke
College, South Hadley, MA, 01075
mdyar_at_mtholyoke.edu2Dept. of Geological
Sciences, University of Idaho, Moscow, ID, 83844
mgunter_at_uidaho.edu 3Tasa Graphic Arts, Inc.,
1210B Salazar Rd., Taos, NM, 87671
www.tasagraphicarts.com
This material is based upon work supported by the
National Science Foundation under grants
DUE-9952377 and DUE-0127191. Any opinions,
findings, and conclusions or recommendations
expressed in this material are those of the
authors and do not necessarily reflect the views
of the National Science Foundation.

• PROJECT GOALS
• Create a textbook for mineralogy, a core
  geoscience class usually taught at the sophomore
  level.
• Address a diversity of student perspectives
  ranging from science teachers to geologists,
  across the broader earth sciences, to connections
  with cognate disciplines like chemistry, physics,
  mathematics, and biology.
• Combine the expertise of the authors at Mount
  Holyoke College and the University of Idaho with
  those of animators/illustrators at Tasa Graphic
  Arts, Inc.
• Incorporate modern pedagogy both explicitly (a
  lengthy Preface chapter provides an overview of
  spiral and inductive learning) and structurally
  (by creating chapters at successive levels of the
  learning spiral).
• Reproduce every gray-scale textbook illustration
  on the accompanying DVD-ROM in color 3-D, with
  animations and interactive exercises.
• Include a mineralogical database that can be used
  for mineral identification, movies of crystal
  structures, x-ray structure patterns, optical
  properties, etc.
• Improve the quality of science teacher
  preparation, add diversity to the textbooks in
  this field, and provide for integration of
  technology into earth science and related
  curricula.

SAMPLE PAGES FROM THE TEXT
SEARCHABLE MINERALOGY DATABASE
The DVD-ROM that accompanies the text includes a
searchable database (above) containing physical
and optical properties of minerals. The database
can be printed out in a nicely-formatted set of
pages (below) to allow students to make
personalized lab manuals.
Above The text uses an informal tone that is
designed to make students comfortable with the
material. Each chapter begins with a personal
anecdote about the material to be covered. For
example, the essay above at left describes the
difficulty in converting recipes from weights to
volumes a process that is perfectly analogous
to converting chemical analyses of minerals to
formulas. At above right is perhaps the most
popular photo in the textbook the accompanying
video (on the DVD-ROM) of a pig race already has
a cult following! Below four pages from the
text showing various topics covered.
Above Two figures from the Preface. At left is
the learning spiral that shows the organization
of the textbooks subject matter. At right is a
table showing the titles of each chapter, and the
three levels of the textbook. As indicated,
Chapter 1 covers all the subject matter in the
entire book (briefly!). Chapters 2-6 present
information on hand sample identification,
followed by introductory material on each of the
four main themes of the text. Chapters 7-24
cover advanced material, with four chapters for
each of the four themes introduced at level 2.

• OUTCOMES
• 709 pp. text published by Mineralogical Society
  of America, October 2007.
• Sold at cost (90/book)
• Sales are brisk fall 08 adoptions still being
  counted.
• We have become involved in research involving
  best practice for effective use of animations in
  teaching geological concepts an NSF proposal to
  support this future work is currently under
  review.

Hi Dr. Dyar, My name is Cathleen Brown and I
work for Dr. Michael Wise.  I found your
relatively recent book, Mineralogy and Optical
Mineralogy in Mikes office last week while he
was on a trip.  I swiped it from his office and
scanned through it and I want you to know that I
think the book is fantastic.  I wish that I would
have had it when I was learning optical and
mineralogy.  The diagrams were so easy to
understand and I particularly found the chapters
dedicated to analytical methods and mineral
formulas useful.  When I was in graduate school,
I felt that I was using equipment before I really
understood how it worked.  Thank you for your
great book!  I was really impressed! Sincerely, C
athleen Brown
Above Although the entire textbook is printed in
gray-scale, the cover art is done in color to 1)
entice the students into opening the cover by
displaying a museum-quality mass of quartz
crystals, and 2) serve as a useful reference for
optical mineralogy by showing the retardation
color chart, and various reference images of
interference figures. Every illustration in the
text is also shown in color (and 3-D) on the
accompanying DVD-ROM.