4 Chapter 4. Virtually there!
Learning Objectives
Once in the field it might be a little overwhelming to know where to start. At the end of this chapter the student will
- have a clear idea about a step by step process to field data collecting.
- understand the relevance of the details observed.
4.1. Introduction
Remember the feeling of reading a chapter book for the first time? You start obviously with Chapter 1 eager to dive into the story. But reading just the first line is not going to be enough to have a clear idea about the storyline, about the characters or the relationships between them. Page by page, clue by clue, the story of the chapter comes into focus and by the end of the chapter you can probably summarize in one sentence what the chapter was about. Yet, it is just a portion of the story; an allusion, a feeling, and at the end you might have even more questions than answers. All the other connection pieces are going to be revealed one by one, chapter by chapter. And together, all the chapters contribute to create a clear picture that allows you to understand the story.
It is the same approach when dealing with a geological sequence. Every geological unit is like a chapter in a book. For each chapter you have to collect your evidence and follow the clues hidden in the rocks to decipher this part of the story. But together, all the data collected about the studied units create a big picture that encompasses millions of years of geological processes, geomorphological changes and plants and animals evolution.
Before we start deciphering the geological history of the Late Cretaceous Eastend Formation, the last formation deposited in the Avonlea Badlands area, remember that in the field you should pay attention to all the details, even if they might not make a lot of sense. It is easier to generalize when you have a lot of details than to extract details from a very general description!
4.2. So… how do I start?
It is easier to talk about how to start a research study in the field and have the theoretical aspects nailed down. The reality is that in the field you’ll probably feel overwhelmed. Where to start? Which details shall be noted first? Is this aspect more important than the other one? Should we start at the top or at the bottom of the sequence? Are these features important? Do we split the team so we can work faster? What if we forgot something?
To all these question, we usually have one answer that it is more of a question than an answer. We look at the worried faces of the overwhelmed team and we ask them: “How do you eat a white elephant?”. Peoples’ reaction is of utter confusion and then we answer to them: “Bite by bite. With taking notes for scientific purposes it is the same. Clue by clue, one manages to understand completely the story. The trick is to breathe in and out, follow a pattern to make sure you do not forget anything, and let the story reveal to you instead of forcing it to happen.”
There are though, a few questions