Mount Rainier National Park
Help your class trace how one volcano shapes ice, water, forests, and hazards at Mount Rainier
This virtual field trip helps grades 6-12 investigate Mount Rainier as a connected landscape. Students follow the relationships among an active volcano, heavy snow and ice, glacier-fed rivers, forests, Indigenous cultural landscape, and volcanic hazards.
The seven-stop route begins at Paradise, then moves to Nisqually Glacier and Glacier Bridge before crossing to Sunrise, Ohanapecosh, Box Canyon, and Kautz Creek. Each stop ties scientific evidence and cultural context to a specific place students can explore on the map.
Students can use the free preview at Stop 1 to try the format. The remaining stops unlock with a classroom code and support whole-class projection or student devices.
Highlights
- 7 classroom stops from Paradise to Kautz Creek
- Locked Google Maps views, supporting images, and complete on-screen transcripts
- Volcanism, glaciers, rivers, forests, Indigenous cultural landscape, debris flows, and lahars
- Designed for grades 6-12 earth science, environmental science, geography, and hazards units
- Free Stop 1 preview; unlock the complete trip for class
- Explain how a glacier connects snow accumulation, ice flow, meltwater, sediment, and changing river channels.
- Use maps and visual evidence to connect elevation with subalpine, forest, and river environments.
- Describe how debris flows and lahars travel through river valleys and create hazards far from a volcanic summit.
- Discuss why Mount Rainier is both a protected ecosystem and an Indigenous cultural landscape.