Learning+Experience+10+rocks+get+smaller


 * Learning Experience 10: Minerals and Rocks: Getting Smaller, Getting Smoother**

Materials:
 * Hand lenses
 * Sand
 * Gravel
 * Rocks of different sizes
 * A very smooth rock

Learning Targets: 1. I can explain how rocks get smaller and smoother. How do rocks get smaller and smoother?

Procedure:
 * 1) Revisit list of Big Questions / Ideas of Geology: things we wonder. What should we add or change or answer?
 * 2) Other Big Ideas to talk about: //See what ideas kids have.//
 * 3) Where do rocks come from?
 * 4) Do rocks change? Do rocks move?
 * 5) Introduce learning target.
 * 6) Today we're going to be thinking about this question: H ow do rocks get smaller and smoother? Make a chart of ideas.
 * 7) We're going to do that by looking at rocks of different sizes and seeing what we can observe. While you look at them, I'm going to ask you to put them in order from the biggest rock in your basket to the smallest. I want you to be thinking, Where do these rocks come from? H ow could bigger rocks turn into smaller rocks?
 * 8) Students work in a small group or pairs to line a collection of rocks up from largest to smallest.
 * 9) As they finish, give them a spoonful of sand and a spoonful of gravel and have them look closely at them with a hand lens. After examining them, they add them to their organized rocks. (Ring the bell and explain this after they get started).
 * 10) Come back to the rug. Show them "gravel" and "sand" and "silt." Where do you think the sand and gravel came from? How about the silt? A dd to our list of ideas of how rocks get smaller and smoother.


 * 1) Read from the FOSS geology book -- especially the sections about how rocks change. There are enough copies for every student to have his / her own book and follow along.
 * 2) Exit ticket: What did you think about in geology today? Practice with a partner: Think it, Say it, Write it.

//**Optional**// //Geology Walk, whole-class// 3. After everyone has had a chance to do the above activity during center time, share ideas about where sand comes from, and how rocks get to be smooth. Pass around a smooth rock and ask how they think it got so smooth. 4. Prepare students to take a walk outside to look for evidence of how rocks get smaller and smoother. Ask what they think they might see. Outside, ask questions about tree roots pushing up through the sidewalk or a wall, worn down parts of walls or sidewalks, water hitting rocks, etc. 5. Inside, share ideas about what makes rocks smaller and smoother, and what evidence they gathered: hitting them with a hammer, trees growing into them, things falling on them, water running on them, etc. Ask how long they think it takes for rocks to get smaller and smoother.