We’re geographers!
In Year 4, our geography topic this half-term has been volcanoes. As you would’ve seen in our class assembly, your children have been loving it and have become volcano experts!
We began exploring a case study of Mount Vesuvius and its devastating eruption that destroyed the town of Pompeii. Despite this tragic eruption, roughly 3,000,000 people still leave near Mount Vesuvius so we wanted to find out why.
Your children began by analysing some data of the major eruptions of Mount Vesuvius and the human death toll. They discussed how over time, the number of deaths from each eruption have declined.
So, we wanted to discover why this was. To do this, we learnt all about the different techniques that can help us predict eruptions and therefore protect people from them.
- Seismometer – used to measure vibrations in the Earth which could show when an eruption is coming.
- Tiltmeters and GPS satellites – used to monitor changes in the landscape as volcanoes tend to swell near an explosion.
- Spiders – robots called spiders are used to measure the gases escaping from a volcano.
- Thermometers – used to measure the temperature of the ground as volcanoes get hotter when magma starts to rise through the main vent.
- Pattern spotting -looking back at previous eruptions means scientists can start to spot patterns.
Help at home: ask your child what they think the most effective technique for predicting eruptions would be and why?