Name:
____________
Year 9 Science – Ch. 10
Mars bar Plate Tectonics
The three layers of the Mars bar will be a model for plate tectonics todayEARTH’S LAYERS - Label the diagram
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thin’, brittle, hard, cold,
solid outer shell
LAYERS OF A MARS BAR
If you cut a Mars bar in ½…
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Flexible, gooey, hot
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Hot, liquid (very high
pressure, more heavy
metals than upper layers)
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So hot that pressure has
forced it into a solid.
Made of metals.
Q1. Fill out the table below:
Mars bar layer
Earth layer
Chocolate
Mantle
Nougat
Q2. If the earth were a Mars bar, tectonic plates would be made out of _____________________.
Q3. Which Earth layer is missing from the Mars bar model? ___________________________.
Name:
____________
Pointer finger
BOUNDARY 1:
Unwrap the candy bar.
Hold bar with two hands.
Using your thumb and index finger gently pull the ends
of the Mars bar apart.
DO NOT separate bar into two halves.
Set bar down to answer questions.
Mars bar
Q4. Draw a quick sketch of your ‘model’ from the side.
Q5. Which layer of the Earth ‘cracked’?
_____________________
Q6. What type of boundary is modeled by the candy bar? ______________
Q7. Why would there be earthquakes at a divergent boundary?
Pointer finger
BOUNDARY 2
Pick up the Mars bar.
Gently push in from the ends of the bar.
Place fingers on the edge of the bar, not the top and bottom.
Try to keep bar in a straight line.
Mars bar
Side View
Q7. Draw a sketch of your model from the side.
Q8. What type of boundary is modeled by the candy bar?
____________
Q9. What geologic feature would you expect to form at a boundary where plates push together?
Name:
____________
Pointer finger
BOUNDARY 3
With fingers & thumbs on long edges of bar,
slide your right hand forward, pull your left hand back.
Q10. Draw a quick sketch of your model.
Q11. What type of boundary is modeled by the candy bar?
____________
Q12. What might you expect to occur along this type of
boundary?
________________________________________________________________________
Q13. One limitation of this model is that your fingers pulling and pushing is not a natural
geologic process. What natural processes might cause the motions of Earth’s plates? How
could we represent that in our lab?
________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________
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Eat
Model
Now