Thursday, December 16, 2010

I'm so depressed

Gave a geology final exam today and put an easy question on it (I thought it was a gift to the students).  "What is the age of the Earth in Ma?"  "Ma" as they all should know, means mega annum or million years and it's how ages are reported on their geologic time scales. Anything between 4,500 and 4,600 Ma would have been accepted for credit but most missed it.  The age of the Earth was only mentioned a dozen or more times since the first day of classes (when I mentioned the age of the Earth is one of the main important themes in geology). We also had a 90 minute lecture on radiometric dating and the age of the Earth.  I guess no one was listening.  Oh, did I mention this was a lab Physical Geology course for science or education majors?  Sigh.
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1 comment:

  1. Dana HunterDecember 22, 2010 at 5:30 AM

    Came here via a Google search for ice caves, found your post from July 4, and couldn't help looking around the place. Wonderful! You'll be on my blog roll as soon as I get round to updating the bloody thing.

    Anyway. Now that introductions are outta the way, I can give you a *virtual hug*. This is depressing. And confirms my suspicion that too many people don't have the brains evolution gave to a cantaloupe.

    OTOH, makes me think that mebbe I should go for a geo degree at my ripe old age after all. It'd be fun raising the curve....

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