Earth/Environmental Review Questions(Draw, label and answer these q’s.)
Plate Tectonics
1.) How does, mantle convection, ridge push and plate gravity pull, drive plate movement?
2.) What type of plate boundary is located by: Mid-Ocean Ridges, ocean trenches, and coastal
continental volcanic mountains?
3.) How and when did the following North Carolina landforms form?
a.) Appalachian Mountains?
b.) Piedmont?
c.) Coastal Plain?
d.) Fall Zone?
e.) Barrier Islands?
4.) How is the earth’s magnetic field formed and from what does it protect us?
5.) How does Glaciation and Mountain building, effect sea level?
Volcanoes
What is the difference between lava and magma?
What type of Volcanoes are found at: Divergent, Convergent and IntraPlate Boundaries?
Why are the Volcanoes different at these boundaries?
What are lahars and ash flows?
How can Volcanic eruptions change local and world climate?
Earthquakes
Where do earthquakes typically occur?
How do you find the epicenter of an earthquake?
What is the focus of an earthquake? What are the 3 types of earthquake waves?
How do you find the magnitude of an earthquake?
Where do deep and shallow earthquakes typically occur? (Types of plate boundaries.)
Rock Cycle
What are the 3 types of rocks? How are they formed?
What is physical and chemical weathering?
Deposition and Erosion? Crystallization and Cementation?
Draw and explain the Rock Cycle.
Weathering and Erosion
What are the 4 components, and their percents, that make up soil?
What is the difference between: sand, silt and clay?
What are organics?
How does climate, topography and rock composition can physical and chemical weathering rates?
How does wind, water, ice and gravity erode landscapes?
How is Acid Rain formed? What are the 3 main types of Acid Rain? What does Acid Rain do to ecosystems? (Terrestrial and Aquatic)
Water
Draw, label and explain the Water Cycle. (Include: infiltration, evaporation, transpiration, etc.)
Explain the difference between river basins and river watersheds.
Draw, label and explain: Aquifers, Aquitards, Zone of Saturation, Zone of Aeration, Water Table, Springs,
Wells, Aquifer depletion, Subsidence, Salt water intrusion, Artesian wells, etc.
What is Bio-Accumulation and Bio-Magnification. (Which metals accumulate in organisms?)
Why do we worry about wetland and estuary degradation?
What are point and non-point sources of pollution? (How does sedimentation, storm-water runoff,
agricultural run-off influence non-point pollution?)
Oceans
Explain how surface and deep ocean currents move, and how they distribute heat away from the
equator to the poles.
How do the worlds oceans influence climate on Continents?
What is the Coriolis affect?
Draw, label and explain how High tides and Low tides are formed.
Draw, label and explain how earth has 4 seasons.
How does increased CO2 in the world’s atmosphere affect our oceans? (Acidification) And how does this
increase affect organisms in our oceans?
Draw, label and explain Global Warming and how this affects our oceans.
Biomes, Biodiversity and Invasive Species
What are biotic and abiotic factors? (Name 3 types of abiotic factors.)
How can biotic and abiotic factors affect biodiversity?
What are 4 good reasons we need to care about biodiversity?
What is Range of Tolerance and Limiting Factors?
Name 4 different types of Biomes, and name the 2 factors that greatly determine what type of Biome
will be present.
How has human population growth affected: habitat alteration, introduction of invasive species,
pollution, and overharvesting of various plant and animal species?
Name 3 types of invasive species, and their affect on natural ecosystems.
What is carrying capacity & ecological footprints? (How can you reduce your Ecological Footprint?)
Alternate Energy
What are heat islands, and how do cities alleviate these within a city?
How do you maximize sustainable use of natural resources?
Where does: oil, gas, uranium, coal, and natural gas come from? (How are they harvested?)
Why are we trying to reduce are use of these energy resources?
Why are solar, wind and wave/tide energy sources so little utilized?
Which 2 energy sources will continue to grow as we move into the future?
What is Global Warming and what gasses cause Global Warming?
How do electric/hybrid vehicles lesson global warming?
Where does 50% of America’s electricity come from?
Atmosphere/Weather
What are the names of our 4 layers of atmosphere and what layer do we live in?
What layer has the “good” ozone in it? What layer has the “bad” ozone in it?
How is this good and bad ozone made? What does the good ozone and bad ozone do to organisms?
What is El Nino and La Nina? Where do they occur? And why do we care about them?
Draw, label and explain High Pressure and Low Pressure systems. (Including their weather map symbol.)
What is the composition of clouds? And what makes wind?
Where should you go, and what should you do if a tornado or a hurricane is heading your way?
What is the difference between Nuclear Fission and Nuclear Fusion? Which one happens in the earth’s
core and which one occurs on the sun?
Which electromagnetic waves (radiant energy/sunlight) are filtered out due to our atmosphere, and
which ones make it too earth?
Astronomy
Where did the Universe, our galaxy and our solar system come from?
What are 2 pieces of evidence that help prove this theory? (Remember a theory is back by a lot of
evidence; the proof of atoms is still called the atomic theory.)
Draw a the hypothetical Universe: with the 4 main galaxies with in it, the approximate distance across
and between them, the approximate number of stars within them, and “our” solar systems location in
“our” galaxy.
Explain Precession in terms of “our” earth.
Explain Nutation, due to the moons gravitation force on the earth.
Explain Barycenter, in relation to the moon and the earth and in relation to the sun and “our” solar
system.