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Changing Earth’s Surface and Geologic Time
(Chapters 7-10)
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Where are the youngest rocks on the ocean floor located? Near mid-ocean ridges
How quickly do the plates move? 1-12 cm per year
What evidence do scientists have for continental drift? Matching rock structures and fossils
What conditions help to make a good fossil? Hardened parts, buried quickly, protected from
scavengers
What does it mean if the same type of fossil is found in two separate rock layers? They are part
of one deposit
How do scientists determine different classifications of geologic time? By looking at the different
types of organisms living at that time.
Which era has extensive mountain building? Cenozoic Era
What happens if an organism does not adapt to its environment? It will die out.
Where does subduction take place? At convergent boundaries
What dangers occur at a volcanic eruption? Lava flows, pyroclastic flows, mud slides
Compare an earthquake to the stretching of a rubber band. The rocks in Earth’s crust stretch
and tension builds. When the rocks break, the tension is released in the form of waves, causing
an earthquake.
What makes an excellent index fossil? Abundant, available for a short amount of time,
geographically widespread
Understand how to determine the relative age of a rock structure by looking at the different
layers.
Write the following vocabulary words:
 Lithosphere—the crust and the upper mantle
 Asthenosphere—the lower taffy-like part of the mantle
 Continental Drift—hypothesis that continents have slowly moved to their current
locations
 Transform Fault Boundary—plates slide past each other; forms earthquakes
 Convergent Boundary—plates move towards each other; forms mountains
 Divergent Boundary—plates move away from each other; forms volcanoes
 Seismic Waves—earthquake waves
 Primary Waves—smallest and fastest waves
 Secondary Waves—medium sized earthquake waves
 Surface Waves—slowest, biggest, and most damaging waves
 Lava—the molten material that flows onto Earth’s surface
 Relative Age—a rock’s age in relation to other objects/rocks
 Cenozoic Era—era of recent life; life forms include humans, marine animals, and
reptiles; time of mountain building
 Mesozoic Era—era of middle life; life forms include birds, dinosaurs, and angiosperms
 Paleozoic Era—era of ancient life; life forms include marine organisms
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Precambrian Time—longest period of Earth’s history; life forms include cyanobacteria
Cyanobacteria—blue green algae present in Precambrian time
Fossil—remains, imprints, or traces of once-living organisms
Mold—cavity left in rock by a decayed organism
Original Remains—actual organism or parts of organism protected from decay
Radiometric—method of dating rocks when the amounts of parent and daughter
materials are measured
Absolute Dating—method using properties of atoms in rocks and other objects to
determine their ages
Uniformitarianism—principle stating that Earth’s processes occurring today are similar
to those that occurred in the past
Carbon—element found in tissues of most organisms
Half Life—time it takes for half of the atoms in a radioactive element to decay
Unconformities—gaps found in rock records
Radioactive—kind of decay that results in the formation of a different element