Regents Earth Science Homework Week 5
Monday-Wednesday:
1. Do this Map Quiz- Match the contour line drawing in the PHOTO columns with the
corresponding contour line image in the TOPO columns. Don’t get frustrated - several are very
similar. HINT: The Arrows in the TOPO images point downhill.
PHOTO Columns
TOPO Columns
Answers - A=5;B=6;C=2;D=1 or 8;E=3;F=4;G=7 or 1;H=8
If your answers don't agreed figure out why. Don't cheat yourself.
2. Complete the following cross-section along the line formed by the trail between the car and
the picnic table. CI = 50'
3. Given the topographic map below, which of the four choices below accurately depicts the
correct profile between points X and Y?
Thursday- Friday: New Topic- Earth Materials
Read Text pp. 182- 188 and ESRT page 10 and page 1 (bottom 1/3)
1) Answer #23 on page 189 of the text
2) Which 2 elements of the crust are #1 and #2 most common in both mass and volume?
3) What 2 elements are found in almost all surface rocks?
Regents Earth Science Homework Week 6
Remember: Attend lab every week on your programmed day and period!
PLEASE NOTE: You must have the free program “Quicktime” installed on your computer to
run your text’s CD-Rom. You can install it from the folder on your CD or get a later version
from the Apple website (http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/). You do not need to
install anything but the core Quicktime program on your computer.
>>>Have page 16 of your reference tables out to help with this weeks homework<<<
Monday:
1. Read Text pp 20-29; Run CDRom - Earth Materials - Minerals until you answer the questions
correctly.
Tuesday:
1, List the 4 key properties of minerals that allow you to tell if something is a mineral..
2. List the Physical Properties of minerals that allow you to tell them apart.
3. Which of the 4 Key Properties of minerals is responsible for their Physical Properties? ( What
causes a minerals physical properties?)
Wednesday:
The Mohs scale of hardness is missing from your Reference Tables yet its values appear in the
“Hardness” column on page 16!
***Minerals can scratch themselves or anything lower on the Mohs scale***
1. Diamond is rated a 10 on the Mohs scale; Why can it scratch glass?
2. If something scratches glass, is it always a diamond? Why/Why not?
3. Why are most hard minerals also brittle (break easily)? (This is a hard one!)
Thursday and Friday: Use the Mohs scale above and page 16 of your Reference Tables (ESRT) to
find the name of the following minerals:
1. This brassy colored mineral leaves a dark streak, can scratch glass but can be scratched by a
steel file (making sparks). What is it?
2. This clear mineral breaks with cleavage, can be scratched by a fingernail, forms cubic crystals
and vaguely smells like the ocean. What is it?
3. A fingernail cannot scratch this clear to white colored mineral but a penny can scratch it. It breaks
with cleavage and bubbles with HCl acid. What is it?
4. This common mineral comes in may colors, scratches bothy glass and a steel file but can be
scratched by the mineral Topaz. It fractures when broken. What is it?
Regents Earth Science Homework Week 7
Answers (in order) to last week’s mineral HW- Pyrite, Halite, Calcite or Dolomite, Quartz
Monday: Read Text pp. 40-44
Draw and put direction arrows on your own version of the ROCK cycle in your notebook. Use text
p.41 and the ESRT p.6 as a guide for your drawing.
Tuesday: Read Text pp. 45-47 and run CR-Rom “Earth Materials” Part B “Rock Cycle”
1) What do Granitic and Felsic have in common? (Hint: See ESRT p.6)
2) What do Basaltic and Mafic have in Common? (Hint: See ESRT p.6)
3) Which rock is denser- Granitic or Basaltic Rock? (Hint: See ESRT p.10- top)
Wednesday: Run CD-Rom “Earth Materials” Part C “Igneous Rocks” Parts 1-3
1) What is the difference between magma and lava?
2) Why do Igneous rocks that cool quickly contain small crystals and have a smooth texture?
Thursday: Review Text pp.41-47; Read Text pp. 226-240 (Volcanoes)
1). What happened to the residents of the ancient Roman city of Pompeii that were caught in a
pyroclastic flow?
Friday: Read Text pp 240-248 (Volcanoes) and check out figure 8:24 on p.246
1) Basaltic columns like those in your reading can be found along the Hudson River on the New
Jersey side from Manhattan Island to the Bronx. You can see them from the Circle-line cruise if you
look west. What does the presence of these formations tell you about the geologic past of this area?
Top View - Columnar Basalt
Palisades- View from Hudson River North-West
Regents Earth Science Homework Week 8
***REMEMBER TO BRING IN YOUR PROJECT ROCK FOR A ROCK-CHECK
BEFORE STARTING YOUR MP2 PROJECT REPORT***
Monday: Answer the following:
1. Some igneous rocks are vesicular (contain bubbles), what causes the bubbles in these rocks?
2. Only igneous rocks have vesicles so if your rock has vesicles it has to be an igneous rock. How
else can you tell if your rock is an igneous rock?
3. How is it possible for a rock to float on water?
4. Name an igneous rock that can float on water? (Hint: you may have it in your bathroom.)
Tuesday: Answer the following using page 6 of you reference tables:
1, Name the light colored igneous rock with crystals from 1-10mm in size.
2. Name a dark colored igneous rock with a fine texture and no vesicles (2 possible answers).
3. Name a light colored but dark looking igneous rock that looks like a piece of glass.
4. What is the average percentage quartz in Rhyolite, Granite and Pegmatite? (one answer).
5. Felsic igneous rocks are rich in which 2 minerals?
6. Mafic igneous rocks are rich in which 2 metals?
Wednesday: Read Text pp. 45-49 and Answer the following:
Sedimentary rocks make up only 5% (1 in 20) of crustal rocks, yet the odds are 1 in 3 (33%) that the
rock you will actually pick up is a sedimentary rock. What does this difference tell you? (Hint: Where
do you live on the Earth’s crust?)
Thursday: Read Text pp. 50-55 and Answer the following:
1. You know you have a sedimentary rock if it contains fossils. Why are fossils only found in
sedimentary rocks? (Hint: The easiest way to answer this is why fossils aren’t found in igneous rocks
or seen in metamorphic rocks.)
2. What does the word “clastic” mean?
Friday: Use page 7 of your reference table to answer the following:
1. What is the name of the sedimentary rock composed of pebble-sized rounded fragments?
2. What is the name of the sedimentary rock composed of pebble-sized sharp edged (angular)
fragments?
3. What is the name of the sedimentary rock composed of sand?
4. What is the name of the sedimentary rock composed of clay-sized flat fragments?
5. What is the name of the crystalline sedimentary rock which formed by precipitating from
evaporating seawater?
6. What is the name of the sedimentary rock where you might find fossil shell fragments?
7. What is the full name of the sedimentary rock composed of ancient compressed plant material?
8. If we were to continue putting the rock in #7 above under heat and pressure we would have a
more dense metamorphic rock which packs the same energy into a smaller piece. What is the full
name of this metamorphic rock?
9. Your great grandparents would have probably heated their house with coal. Although anthracite
coal was more expensive than bituminous coal, if they could afford it, most preferred to use
anthracite coal as fuel. Why did they make this choice?
Regents Earth Science Homework Week 9
Monday:
Review/Re-run CD Rom “Earth Materials” Sections A-E from minerals through Metamorphic
Rocks and answer the following:.
1. Describe the three ways sedimentary rocks are formed.
(Hint: Think Clastic, Chemical and Biological)
2. What common liquid compound plays a role in all 3 of the ways (processes) that sedimentary
rocks are formed in #1 above?
Tuesday: Read text pp 55-63 and the chapter summary on page 63 and answer the following:
1. What are the 2 forces necessary to make metamorphic rocks?
2. What is the source of heat in contact metamorphism?
3. What is the difference between foliation and banding?
4. What is the difference between layers in sedimentary rocks and bands in metamorphic rocks?
(Hint: what are layers and bands made of?)
5. Why do minerals segregate into bands in metamorphic rocks. (Hint: Heat is giving the mineral
atoms energy to move and pressure is giving them a reason to move!)
Wednesday: Answer the following:
1. You have just picked up a rock. How do you know the origin (Igneous, Sedimentary or
Metamorphic) of that rock.
Thursday: Use page 7 of the reference table to answer the following:
1. List the 4 rocks that shale will become if it is put under heat and pressure.
2. Where does marble come from?
3. How does anthracite (hard) coal differ from Bituminous (soft) coal? (Don’t even think of just writing“one is hard and the other is soft”)
4. Rocks are hard and usually brittle. How can they be “folded” without breaking?
(Hint: This question is harder than you might think at first- try approaching it by thinking that
something “breaks” as a way to release pressure placed on it. What would happen if there was no
easy place for this pressure to go… would it still break?)
Friday: Read text pp 11-13 and the summary on page 16 and answer the following:
1. Contrast (explain the difference between) Renewable vs. non-renewable resources.
2. The 3-R’s of environmental conscience are Reduce, Recycle and Re-use. What is the difference
between recycling and re-use?
3. If you use an electric automobile for travel have you eliminated your use of non-renewable
resources? (Hints: How was the car made? How do the batteries get charged?)
4. We have seen that the Earth recycles it’s materials and surfaces. Wouldn’t this mean that
everything is eventually renewable? (Hint: What does eventually mean in this question… How long
do Earth’s recycling processes take?)
IDENTIFYING ROCKS
Remember: Rocks are named by their origin:
•Igneous : previously melted (magma)
•Sedimentary: weathered bits of rock or fossil material cemented together (usually in water).
•Metamorphic: Igneous, sedimentary or even other metamorphic rocks that have been changed
by additional heat, pressure and time.
Igneous rocks look the same everywhere!
•Igneous rocks have hardened after being melted, they are homogeneous.
•No matter how you turn them, igneous rocks look pretty much the same!
If a rock has vesicles it must be an igneous rock
Sedimentary Rocks have “Layers”
•Most sedimentary rocks start in water.
•The layers are granular but you may need a magnifying lens to see them.
•Each layer is made of the same type of rock or mineral as the whole rock.
Limestone is a common sedimentary rock
Fossils are a dead give-away that you have sedimentary rock!
Other rocks “cemented” together is another give-away of sedimentary rocks.
Metamorphic Rocks usually have “bands” made up of the same minerals.
•Metamorphic rocks are changed by additional heat and pressure.
•Bands different from layers in sedimentary rocks because bands are formed by mineral
segregation
•Some minerals may actually form large single mineral crystals (think: Garnets in Schist)
•Bands look different from each other because they’re different minerals
•Distorted or wavy (folded) bands are a give-away of metamorphic rocks- uneven pressure
causes these folds.
Manhattan Schist is very common in N.Y.C.; Marble is metamorphosed Limestone