Rocks and Minerals

Get your classroom rocking with this four-lesson earth science unit. Through a series of shared reading activities and hands-on investigations, young geologists learn about the three types of rocks and the unique properties of each.

Young geologists discover the important role that rocks and minerals play in our everyday lives through this series of hands-on activities. Starting off with a lesson that defines the difference between plants, animals, and minerals,...

Students simulate the effects of erosion on rocks. Students smash cookies into smaller pieces to simulate how sandstone is created from larger rocks. Students hypothesize the types of things that could break up rocks and whether sand...

Get your class outside to observe their surroundings with a instructional activity highlighting weather patterns and seasonal changes. First, learners take a weather walk to survey how the weather affects animals, people, plants, and...

Not only does Patrick the Starfish live under a rock, but so do many other types of creatures. From slugs to centipedes to spiders, rocks are home to all sortss of crawly things. Find out more in the video.

Youngsters pretend they are rocks sitting on a hill. They listen to the provided guided imagery script to conceptualize the process of how rocks change over time. They draw a diagram of what happened to them as rocks during the story. An...

Firts graders distinguish between sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic rocks. They group the rocks into the appropriate group. This is one of the best-organized plans I've seen! Learners watch a PowerPoint presentation which is embedded...

Students collect and sort rocks based on visible characteristics.  In this statistics lesson plan, students determine adequate sample size and categorize rocks based on characteristics.  The book Everybody Needs a Rock is read to discuss...

Learn to forecast the weather using cloud types. Budding meteorologists identify cloud types and learn to use a dichotomous key. As scholars develop observation and identification skills, they discover how different cloud types cause...

Here is a geology lesson plan which invites learners to explore a variety of rocks. They find rocks in the schoolyard and classify them according to size, color, and weight, then read the book Everybody Needs a Rock. Good lesson plan!