Rock Cycle Journey Activity
Goal: Follow one rock through the rock cycle in a model: record what each process makes, where in Earth it happens and how hot it gets, and name the energy that drives each change.
What to do
- Open the Rock Cycle Builder in Explore mode and choose Start from: Granite.
- Apply the six processes in the table, in order. A dashed option can’t happen yet: press it to find out why.
- After each step, record what you get, its family, where it happens and how hot it is (from the Conditions panel).
- Answer the questions. Then try Challenge mode.
Record your rock’s journey (start: granite, deep underground)
| Process | You get | Family | Where it happens | About how hot? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Uplift and exposure | ||||
| 2. Weathering and erosion | ||||
| 3. Deposition: mud in quiet water | ||||
| 4. Compaction and cementation | ||||
| 5. Heat and pressure: medium grade | ||||
| 6. Melting |
Questions
Which step turned loose material into solid rock? What two things happened to make it solid?
Which steps happened at the surface, and which deep underground? What energy drives each group?
The crust gets about 25 °C hotter per km down. Your shale became schist at about 500 °C. How deep was it?
At 1 mm per year of uplift (1 km per million years), how long would the schist take to reach the surface?
Your journey ended as magma. Name two different rocks it could become, and say how each would cool.
A classmate says rocks always go igneous → sedimentary → metamorphic. Find a shortcut in the builder and describe it.
Free from Earth Science Lab · earthsciencelab.org · MS-ESS2-1: Develop a model to describe how Earth’s materials cycle and the flow of energy that drives this cycling.