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Help Me Teach About Rocks


dsbrack
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We are following the WTM suggestions for 2nd grade science.  While I really like the resource suggestions for astronomy, I'm not a fan of how simplistic the earth science encyclopedia is.  I want to go more indepth on the rock cycle and identifying rocks and minerals.  What suggestions does everyone have for this topic?  Favorite library books, resources to help you identify rocks, fun experiments we might want to try?  Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

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Try looking for geology education resources for your province or state.

We also picked up a rock sample set that's helpful, but it can be expensive, depending on where you find it and what it contains.

 

Otherwise...I'd love some more ideas too!

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I liked the books: Let's go rock collecting and also The Magic school Bus inside the earth.

 

Field trips to collect rocks are also fun. We have had various rocks and stones lying all over our house since we first touched this topic. Breaking rocks also always has appeal and working out which were easiest to break and why. Where I live we have what are known as Scratch Patches where children can go to collect precious stones and they do a quick tour too.

 

Linking rock and soil studies can also lead to more experiments and you can look at sedimentation, erosion etc. Take them to the mouth of a river if you can too.

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Geology Rocks  has some great hands on stuff. Like " earth mining' with a cookies, grow a stalactite with salt and others. You could probably check it out from the library and look it over.

http://www.amazon.com/Geology-Rocks-Hands--Activities-Kaleidoscope/dp/1885593295/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1438011248&sr=8-1&keywords=geology+rocks

 

Also Rock On! is a rock bingo with specimens, as you pull the bingo cards it has info about each specimen and the bingo pieces are polished stones. I have bought it for me niece

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What we did was to have sandwich sized ziploc bags when we go to the parks. We ended up with a few granite samples and other small rocks samples. My boys bought some samples from the tech museum as well. We also had fun with the 30 sample set their charter school loaned us when we were with a charter.

 

Something like this set

http://www.amazon.com/American-Educational-Classroom-Collection-Minerals/dp/B005QDPZ6U

 

My kids had fun with the Mohs hardness test experiment.

 

Link (example on page 16)

http://www.sciencecompanion.com/wp-content/uploads/Rocks-Digital-SamplerWEB.pdf

 

We went on cavern tours :)

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Go to Carson City.

Spend an entire day there.

Tour the underground gold mines.

Go through the mineral museum.  It contains a wall-sized painting of the rock cycle that is the clearest I have seen this presented anywhere.

 

That would be awesome, although probably a little out of budget since we live in Ohio.  Maybe someday!

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What we did was to have sandwich sized ziploc bags when we go to the parks. We ended up with a few granite samples and other small rocks samples. My boys bought some samples from the tech museum as well. We also had fun with the 30 sample set their charter school loaned us when we were with a charter.

 

Something like this set

http://www.amazon.com/American-Educational-Classroom-Collection-Minerals/dp/B005QDPZ6U

 

My kids had fun with the Mohs hardness test experiment.

 

Link (example on page 16)

http://www.sciencecompanion.com/wp-content/uploads/Rocks-Digital-SamplerWEB.pdf

 

We went on cavern tours :)

 

We have a pretty cool cavern replica in our museum here that we are going to tour.  We may try to do a field trip to some local caverns if I can find some nearby.

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My nephew and daughters have a favorite activity. They smash rocks and see how far they have to drop them before they break, and use them like eggs to see which chips what. As an activity, that can lead to a lot of interesting discussions about rocks. Particularly for a 6-9 year old, this can really elucidate some of the terminology used and bring it to life and also link it to something useful, such as, what kind of rock do you want under your house?

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