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Rock Cycle Explorations

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Rock Cycle Explorations

Rocks can change from one type to another through processes operating over thousands to millions of years. Read the field notes, then solve each challenge. Use evidence from the notes and your science knowledge. Word bank: sediment, sedimentary rock, magma, metamorphic rock.

Field notes from a changing landscape

A volcanic eruption sends lava across the ground. It cools and solidifies into basalt. Over time, wind and rain break exposed basalt into small grains. Rivers carry the grains to the coast, where they settle in layers. As more layers build up, pressure compacts them and minerals cement them together, forming sedimentary rock. Far underground, heat and pressure can change this rock into metamorphic rock without melting it. If any rock melts, it becomes magma; when magma cools and solidifies, igneous rock forms again.

1.Which processes turn loose sediment into sedimentary rock, according to the field notes?

Cooling and solidification
Compaction and cementation
Melting
Heat and pressure

2.The basalt in the field notes is igneous. What event and process formed it?

3.In the field notes, name one process that breaks basalt into grains and one process that carries the grains towards the coast.

4.True or false? A rock must melt before it can become metamorphic rock.

TrueFalse

5.Complete the sequence using the word bank: basalt → weathering and erosion → → deposition and layering → compaction and cementation → .

6.A piece of sedimentary rock is buried deep underground. Describe the conditions that could turn it into metamorphic rock, and explain what must not happen if it is to remain solid rock.

7.Imagine magma cools slowly underground. What rock type forms, and what might slow cooling do to its crystals?

8.Choose the best explanation for why the rock cycle is not a fixed loop that every rock follows in the same order.

Rocks can follow different pathways and skip stages
Only igneous rocks can change
Every rock changes type once each year
Sediment cannot form from existing rock

9.A rock sample has visible layers made of compacted grains. Identify its most likely rock type and give one clue from the description that supports your answer.

10.A classmate says, “Once a rock becomes metamorphic, it can never change again.” Use the field notes and your science knowledge to give two possible processes that could change metamorphic rock further.

11.Why do many rock-cycle changes take a very long time, even though some events, such as an eruption, can happen quickly?