Teaching in the Kaunertal

Over the summer I had the wonderful opportunity to teach on two week-long interdisciplinary field courses for people training to become biology teachers in Austria (yes, geology is part of the biology curriculum, don't question it, it's just the way it is). The interdisciplinary nature means I was out every day with one (and usually more) expert botanist and zoologist, and each of the three of us tried our best to link our areas of expertise together. This was an enormous amount of fun, firstly because I love identifying animals, insects and plants (birds in particular) and secondly because I learned so much cool new stuff about the natural environment and the way it changes with the landscape. Basically anything that allows me to read the landscape better while hiking around is alright with me!

The course took place in Tirol, right in the middle of the austrian Alps, in the Kaunertal valley. This is a deeply carved u-shaped glacial valley with jagged peaks and hanging valleys surrounding it on every side, including peaks of over 3000m and numerous (though small nowadays) glaciers and remnants of glaciers past. A playground for biologist and geologist alike, with perfectly polished rock outcrops and textbook changes in species types and distributions with elevation, usually right next to each other! Of course, the views are utterly spectacular even if you ignore the wealth of knowledge hidden within them.

My job description was literally to get people excited about rocks, obviously something that comes naturally to me and that I attacked with great pleasure! I am more than pleased that my methods seemed to work too, though I for one will say I'm not as surprised as my teaching counterparts, as I am pretty certain that once you just show people geology, they cannot fail to be enthralled.

The pace of the the 2 weeks was pretty gruelling, and I have the utmost respect for my colleagues who kept it up for one or two weeks more during the summer field trip season, I couldn't have. Getting up for breakfast at 7am (or on one memorable weather-dodging and admittedly totally worth it day, at 6am) was very hard, and sometimes I was working till 10pm or later, though with breaks in between. Still, work isn't so bad if there are interesting things to learn and teach, and all in all it was a very positive experience. I really felt like I could practice my much-neglected field skills and truly feel like a geologist again, using all my knowledge from my many years of study and not just my narrow specialisation.

Naturally there was still enough time to take photos, and oh my there was indeed enough natural beauty to to photograph! The gallery this time is a bloated 20 pictures long but I promise there are some great views and a lot of variety awating people with the patience to click through it all!

Right now I am living in Duesseldorf, which is considerably less mountainous but I've already been on a couple of hikes. When the iron research allows you shall see the results of those here, never fear!

Bis bald,

der Tom.