Minerals and Rocks Unit Study Guide

A mineral with a hardness of 6 will scratch any mineral with a hardness ________________.

During the rock cycle, a collision between two continental plates could force one plate down toward the heat of the mantle, producing

The Law of Superposition would lead us to choose which of the following layers as the oldest?

If layer C is sedimentary rock and layer G is igneous rock, which would be more likely to contain fossils?

List the following minerals in order of decreasing hardness: apatite, calcite, corundum, feldspar, and talc.

If an unknown mineral has a hardness between 5 and 9, what could you do to the mineral to find out more about its hardness?

What would you expect to happen if you rubbed a mineral of hardness 7.5 against a piece of quartz?

What would happen if you rubbed a piece of fluorite against a piece of feldspar?

Coal is an example of a(an) ____________________ rock, a sedimentary rock that forms where thick layers of plant and animal remains are deposited.

 Dissolved minerals and particles of sediment stick together to form sedimentary rock in a process called ____________________.

 The splitting of a mineral along flat surfaces is a property called ____________________.

Which minerals in the table will scratch quartz?

Erosion on a mountain range that was pushed up as a result of two continental plates colliding will lead to the formation of

What step in the rock cycle would be required to change granite into sandstone?

A series of processes on Earth’s surface and in the crust and mantle that slowly changes rocks from one kind to another is called

The heat that changes a rock into metamorphic rock comes from

Heat and pressure deep beneath Earth’s surface can change any rock into

Chalk formed from sediments made of skeletons of microscopic living things in the ocean must be a(an)

The sedimentary rock formed when water deposits tiny particles of clay in very thin, flat layers is called

The process in which dissolved minerals crystallize and glue particles of sediment together is

The process by which sediment settles out of the water or wind carrying it is

The most abundant intrusive rock in the continental crust is

Igneous rock that formed from lava that erupted onto Earth’s surface is called

Where does most metamorphic rock form?

Rock that forms from the cooling of magma below the surface or lava at the surface is called

Igneous rock that cools very quickly when it forms may have a texture that is

The softest mineral on the Mohs hardness scale is

Most minerals do NOT split apart evenly. Instead, they have a characteristic type of

What is the hardest known mineral?

If you broke a mineral into tiny pieces, each piece would

Although brick, steel, and glass all come from substances found in Earth’s crust, they are not classified as minerals because

The repeating pattern of a mineral’s particles forms a solid called a(an)

A mineral is inorganic, which means that it contains