Name: _______________________________
Date: ______
Study Guide: Rocks and Minerals and Landforms
Study your landform notes! You should be able to name, define and explain how at
least 3 landforms were formed.
Please use complete sentences and define the following terms:
Erosion:
Erosion is the movement of materials away from one place. Gravity is the main force that causes erosion and it
can cause erosion in many ways. One way is gravity causes rivers to flow and as rivers flow downstream the
river picks up and carries sediments with it. Over time these sediments wear away or erode the riverbanks.
Weathering:
Weathering is a slow, destructive process that breaks rocks into smaller pieces called sediments. There are two
types of weathering. Mechanical weathering is when rocks are broken into smaller pieces due to gravity and
chemical weathering is when materials in a rock change due to a chemical process.
Please Review the definitions of the different types of rocks and how they were formed and fill in the
missing parts of each definition. The first two have been done for you.
Metamorphic Rock: A metamorphic rock is formed when a rock is changed through extreme heat and
pressure.
Igneous Rock: An igneous rock is formed when magma cools and solidifies. Igneous rocks can form below
the earth's surface (intrusive) or above the earth's surface (extrusive).
Sedimentary Rock:
A sedimentary rock forms when layers of materials and rock particles settle on top of each other and then
harden.
Review the Rock Cycle:
You should know how a rock can move from one stage to the next in the rock cycle and label it on the rock cycle.
label the missing parts of the rock cycle below using the words in the word bank, some parts have
already been labeled for you.
Word Bank:
Melting
extrusive
heat and pressure
deposition
weathering
compaction & cementation
intrusive
erosion
Weathering
deposition
Compaction and
Cementation
rock cools on earth's
surface:
Extrusive
rock cools below
earth's surface:
Intrusive
Heat and pressure
Melting