Science Lesson Plans: Rocks
We will focus on rocks the first week:
Rocks are solid pieces of the earth’s crust, made up of one or more different minerals.
Rocks are of three major types: igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic. Igneous rocks
are formed when magma solidifies; granite, pumice, and obsidian are good examples.
Sedimentary rocks are the largest group and are formed by the cementing together of
particles of rock, clay, or sand; shale, limestone, and sandstone are examples.
Metamorphic rocks are the least common and are formed when igneous or sedimentary
rocks are placed under extreme heat or pressure or when a chemical change takes place in
their composition; slate, quartz, and marble are examples of metamorphic rocks.
The following science concepts will be addressed this week:
1. Rocks have unique physical properties, and these properties can be used for
classification
2. There are many kinds of rocks
3. Rocks slowly change by wearing away
4. Old plants and animals leave prints in rocks
5. Minerals form crystals
Extra Support Materials: Please come by my room to copy the investigations from the
resource books – I will make one copy and you can make your copy from mine. I am
using Discovery Science(DS), Science Experiences for the Early Childhood Years(SE),
and Science is Simple(SS), and More Picture-Perfect Science Lessons(MPPS)
Texas Pre-Kindergarten Guidelines: Science Domain
Monday: What We Know About Rocks
Guiding Question: What do you know about rocks?
Materials: assortment of rocks (different types, sizes, weights, colors, textures),
Discovery Chart entitled: What We Know About Rocks; a paper bag,
Vocabulary: rock, stone, bolder, pebble; compare, descriptive words, such as dull,
sparkly, shiny, and rough; magnify, hand lens, loupe, observation, various attributes of
color, shapes, texture, crystals; Geologist
Large Group: Some of the open-ended questions that you could ask the children are:
What do you know about rocks? Where do you find rocks? What happens when rocks get
wet? How can rocks move? What do we use rocks for? (you can use one or all of these
questions, depending on the variety of responses that your children share). Record all that
they know about rocks on the chart. Tell the children that they will be Geologists this
week – people who study rocks. Read: Everybody Needs A Rock by Byrd Baylor
Small Group: Not All Rocks Look Alike (DS, pp. 80-81). Each child will choose a rock
and after looking at it closely with a loupe or hand lens, describe their rock to the group
(up to 4 children in a group). Each child will draw their rock in their science
journals…see printed lesson for more details.
Extending the lesson: Go on a rock hunt around the campus (become Geologists or
Rock Hounds). Have the children bring in some rocks that they have found from around
their homes. Give each child a container with their name on it, so that they can keep their
special rocks in a special display area during the next two weeks.
Tuesday: Use our sense of touch to describe a rock
Materials: rocks, blindfolds, paper bag
Vocabulary: coarse, grainy, hard, pointed, rough, sharp, slick, slippery, smooth, soft,
texture, light, heavy
Large Group: Read a book about rocks (Rocks: Hard, Soft, Smooth, and Rough by
Natalie M. Rosinsky is a good one). Explain to the children that they are going to use
their sense of touch to describe a rock. Give each child in the group a rock that has
distinctive characteristics that the children can use descriptive language (not color or
shape…focus on texture)
Small Group: Blind-Folded Rock Swap (DS, pp. 82-83) Children will work in pairs or
groups of 4. Each will select a rock from the collection. They will focus on how their
rock feels. (See printed lesson for more details).
Wednesday: What is that Rock’s Mass
Materials: bucket balance, several rocks of differing masses, science journals,
nonstandard masses, such as counting cubes, bear counters, etc.
Vocabulary: balance heavier, lighter, mass, weight
Large Group: Remind the children of activities that you have done using a bucket
balance (if you have not used one with the children, you will need to help them discover
the concept of why one side of the balance scale goes up when one goes down – which
you might have done during your study of gravity).
Small Group: Do the lesson from DS, page 84: What Is That Rock’s Mass (before
doing this lesson, you should have already determined how many cubes or counters each
rock will weigh; you could number the rocks, and have a chart for each group to record
the number of cubes they used to determine it’s mass).
Thursday: Rocks slowly change by wearing away
Materials: pieces of soft, crumbly rock (shale, soft sandstone), coffee cans with lids,
wrapped hard candy, red and white Starlight (one for each child), hammer, bowl of
replenishable water
Vocabulary: weathering, tumbling, smoothing
Large Group: have some smooth river rock and some rocks with jagged edges. Let the
children see and feel the differences. Ask them, “How do you think this rock got so
smooth and rounded? How long does it take?
Small Group: Use the lesson on page 217 of SE to set up and complete this activity.
Extended lesson on rock weathering – ring stand, water bottle with push/pull lid, long
tub to catch sediment, mineral block
Friday: Fossil Discovery – fossils are the remains of plants or animals that lived a long
time ago that have turned into rock. They are clues to help us learn what happened on the
Earth before people were here.
Materials: assorted fossils, playdough, plaster of Paris, sea shells, leaves or other bits of
nature that can be pressed into playdough to make an imprint
Vocabulary: Paleontologist, fossil, imprint, cast
Large Group: We will be Paleontologist today as we discover fossils hiding in our sand
tables. We will also be making our own fossils. Read a book about fossils, like, Learning
from Fossils
Small Group: follow the lesson on page 136 in SS
Other activities: making a crystal garden with Mrs. Stewart’s Bluing
http://www.mrsstewart.com/pages/scginstructions.htm
Minerals form crystals activities from SE, pages 220 – 223
If you find a rock – MPPS pages 157 – 167 (includes a “pet rock” activity)
Many additional rock activities from DS (pages 106 – 131)
Looking ahead to next week:
We will continue investigating rocks and will begin focusing on soil. Try to collect
some different types of soil from around your house and from around the campus.
Soil is a mixture of small clay, sand, and organic (decaying plant and animal material)
particles. Different types of soils have characteristics amounts of these three materials.
Because soils are different in their composition, they have different physical
characteristics. For examples, some soils retain large amounts of water, while others can
barely hold any water at all.