WELCOME TO DAVE AND VICKI’S
FOURTH GRADE ROCK
AND MINERAL
HOME PAGE
Make your choice from the links below:
What’s this site all about? Back to top.
This
site is about how to incorporate rocks and minerals into a lesson plan.
Specifically the site discusses the uses and presentation of rocks and minerals
geared to the California Earth Science Standard for Fourth Grade. It discusses
the properties of rocks and minerals as well as the process in which they were
formed.
Why
are we doing this? Back to top.
We
are creating this page to assist teachers in creating an effective Earth
Science Lesson Plan. It is intended to be a resource, or guide, to help in customizing
your own lesson plan. As teachers we need to help each other and by doing this,
not only will we be able to be more effective in our teaching, but we can also
use the knowledge of others to our benefit.
Dave and
Vicki are students at Cerritos College. We are both in the Teacher
TRAC Program (Teacher
Training Academy). Teacher TRAC is a program at Cerritos College in conjunction
with transferring to Cal State Long Beach, which is directed to helping
students who want to pursue a teaching career. The program allows us to receive
our Bachelor’s Degree and Multi Subject Teaching Credential and be ready to
teach in four years.
Our goal
is not only to help other teachers, but also to supply adequate information so
that when the lesson plan is completed students will understand two concepts
regarding rocks and minerals. One concept is that students will be able to
identify the basic types of rocks: igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic.
Second, students will be able to identify common rock forms, and common rock
forming materials (including quartz, calcite, feldspar, mica, and hornblende)
and ore minerals by using a table of diagnostic properties. *
To help
achieve our goal we have chosen to use the SDAIE format (Specially Designed
Academic Instruction in English). The California State Senate has passed a bill
(SB1969) that defines SDAIE training requirements as an alternative to the
traditional ESL training component to both bilingual and multi-lingual class
settings. The SDAIE format is geared to helping ESL students through English as
well as hands on experiences.
·
These two
goals are taken from the California Earth Science Standards for Fourth Grade.
Day
One:
Materials: Samples of:
Igneous
Rock Metamorphic Rock
Sedimentary
Rock Quartz
Feldspar Calcite
Sheet
Mica Hornblende
Sand Pebbles
Vocabulary: Igneous
Rock Metamorphic Rock
Sedimentary
Rock Quartz
Feldspar Calcite
Sheet
Mica Hornblende
Magma
Geography
Goal: Learn
characteristics of rocks: size, shape, texture, color,
where
formed, how different types of rocks are formed and
their
uses.
Intro: Read
a story to the class about rocks, and go over the
characteristics
of rocks.
Body: Set
up five different stations where students can look at and identify
different
types of rocks and minerals
Station
1: Igneous Rock
Station
2: Metamorphic Rock
Station
3: Sedimentary Rock
Station
4: Minerals rocks are made of.
Give the
students a hand out for them to fill out while working at the different
stations. The handout has questions about rock texture, color, crystal size,
name, where formed, and possible uses. (This can be used as an assessment tool
also.)
Through: Walk around the school
and identify different types of rocks. (Make sure there are rocks around the
school to observe. If not, before class walk around and strategially place some
around the school.) As homework have each student try to find one type of each
rock.
Day
Two:
Materials: Four
types of colored sand Glass jar
1
cup butter ¾
cup Granulated sugar
¾
cup Light brown sugar 1 Egg
2¼
cups All-purpose flour 1 tsp.
Baking soda
¼
tsp. Salt 1
cup Chopped nuts
1
Chocolate chips (8-10oz)
Vocabulary: Metamorphism Temperature
Measurement Changes
Goal: Show students the
different types of rocks by baking cookies; i.e. "igneous" w/nuts
that don’t change when baked, "metamorphic" with chocolate chips that
melt when baked and take new shape as do rocks when they go through
metamorphism.
Intro: Review facts from
Day One, as well as going into more depth about rocks and how they form.
Body: Get students into
two groups and make two batches of Rock Cookies." One batch with nuts and
one batch with chocolate chips.* Once cookies are made teach lesson on
sedimentary rocks. Use colored sand to show students the way layers form to
make sedimentary rocks. **
* Yield
6-7 dozen cookies.
**
Colored pancakes can be used to show sedimentary rock formations. Just make
batter, separate into four amounts, color with food coloring, cook, and stack
to resemble different sedimentary layers. Nuts and raisins can be used in the
batter to show small rock particles within the different layers.
Through: Have the students
write in their journals about rocks. Suggestions: make up a story about rocks,
write about their favorite rocks, or where rocks are found.
Day
Three:
Materials: Baked
cookies Raw cookie dough
(sample only)
Work
sheet Cups
Milk
Goal: Have students
identify the two different types of "Rock Cookies" (igneous and metamorphic)
by comparing them to rocks using their work sheet from Day One, as well as the
textures and the physical properties (whole nuts vs. melted chocolate chips).
Intro: Review vocabulary
from prior days, and review the three different types of rocks as well as their
characteristics.
Body: Show students a
sample of raw cookie dough again (both types). Pass out cookies to all the
students (each student getting one of each type of cookie). Now have the
students compare their cookies to the raw dough (not to be eaten). Pass out
work sheet to students and have them identify the two different types of
"Rock Cookies", as well as identifying the characteristics of each
comparing them to the actual rocks. Sand, or pancakes, from previous day may
need to be used again for sedimentary rocks
Through: After clean up have a
short test about the past three days’ lessons. Test includes characteristics of
rocks, identifying all three types of rocks, how rocks form, and vocabulary.
Briefly
talk about volcanoes and volcanic rock leading into another earth science
lesson on volcanoes.
Internet Resources Back to top
The Internet sites listed below are here for your convince.
They are meant to assist you in gathering additional information to help assist
in designing or customizing your own lesson plan.
http://www.cde.ca.gov/board/pdf/science.pdf
Arthur Elementary School's Rock and Mineral Links and Lesson Plans
http://www.arthur.k12.il.us/arthurgs/rocklile.htm
The Mineral and Gemstone Kingdom
http://geology.er.usgs.gov/eastern/rock-min.html
http://www.proteacher.com/110073.shtml
This
project was done as part of Dr. Colbath’s (Above) Earth Science/ED Tech class
at Cerritos College.
