Student teachers working with ice

Text & photographer: Lars Demant-Poort

How to give student teachers greater ownership concerning knowledge of ice?

How can ice as a phenomenon impact student teachers' understanding of how and why Greenland looks the way it does?

How primary experiences with ice can influence student teachers' thinking about teaching?

These were some of the questions that popped up on the light board when planning lessons for 2nd year natural science students.

The story begins 8 - 9 years ago.

In 2017, I participated in a project on top of the Greenland Ice Sheet with a group of students from the four high schools.

It struck me that neither primary school nor high school teach what ice is - apart from the fact that it is water in solid form.

Not only did it arouse some wonder - ice and snow are not, and have not been, compulsory subjects in either primary or high schools in Greenland - it also opened a door to a new and exciting topic for both teaching and didactic research.

This was the beginning of a didactic repertoire around ice and snow that was slowly but surely built up in the subject of natural science in our teacher training program.

Fast forward to the academic year 2024 - 2025.

Immediately after starting the semester, I was made aware of an opportunity for funding ice education through the Dr. April Winifred Marshall Memorial Scholarship.

I applied for and received funding to take four female (a foundation requirement) students on a trip to Kangerlussuaq.

The planning of the academic content for the trip was largely placed on the students' shoulders - a goal of co-creative teaching - based on visiting two geographically relevant sites: Russell Glacier and Point 660.

During the total of four working days in Kangerlussuaq, based on the students' wishes and planning, we worked with and studied glacial morphology (how ice has affected the shape of the landscape), moraines around and at both sites - and then we tried using an ice drill (kindly lent by ASIAQ) to drill a smaller ice core at Point 660 - both to see layers in the ice if possible, but also to see possible sediments trapped in the ice.

In the KISS building, where we had put down roots for four days, we met a small research team from Switzerland, who at the time of writing are 120-130 kilometers inside the ice sheet to study how water from melting ice affects the flow of water under the ice.

A cultural highlight of the trip was a dog sled ride - with the challenges that come with an unexpected 25 cm of fresh snow the day before.

The team's experience with ice and ice research will tentatively conclude in September when we will visit the mountain glacier Qassinnguit Sermiat in Kobbefjorden.