Richter Scale

This week I found a new way to convey the logarithmic nature of the Richter Scale. always remember sitting in a geography lesson as a youngster learning about earthquakes just as a small earthquake shook the building. As my new classroom is on the second floor we created a 3.0 (ish) magnitude quake. This causes little damage. I then showed images from 5, 6 and 7 quakes. How did we create the quake? Well (and this was of course fully risk assessed) I asked a couple of students to stand carefully on a table and jump off. This made the floor shake just enough for it to be felt. The class seemed to engage in this demonstration and displayed a better understanding of how the Richter Scale works. Of course, this technique could only work in classrooms that have a shakeable floor! The only other tip is to warn the teacher below!