Wildland Rocks - What's In A Name?
Description: This experiment is an adventure for students to collect rocks in the Wildlands and surrounding neighborhood. It will help them become aware of the different types of rocks and the methods used to identify their characteristics. Hands-on tests will be used to discover the properties of the rocks that have been collected by the students during their exploration of the Wildlands and/or surrounding neighborhood.

Grade Levels: 3 - 12 (Note: This experiment can be simplified or made more challenging depending on the developmental levels of your students. See Teacher Information.)

Approximate Time Involved: One 30 minute session outside collecting rocks. Two 45 minute sessions inside the classroom. First session should be used to identify rocks in their families. The second session should be used to test various properties of identified rocks. One or two 30 minute sessions to examine results, state conclusions, draw inferences and make recommendations.

National Science Standards Addressed:

Content Standard A: As a result of activities in grades K-12, all students should develop

  • Abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry
  • Understanding about scientific inquiry

Program Standard D: The K-12 science program must give students access to appropriate and sufficient resources, including quality teachers, time, materials, and equipment, adequate and safe space, and the community.

  • Good science programs require access to the world beyond the classroom.

Teacher Information:

The Wildlands, surrounding neighborhoods, and parks provide students with an opportunity to explore and collect rocks of various kinds. Your students' rocks can be identified as belonging to one of three major groups: sedimentary, metamorphic, or igneous. You may want to stop there, but you can challenge your students to further recognize a variety of characteristics that will help them identify their specific rocks. Please be aware that even a trained geologist can have difficulty identifying rocks without doing very involved tests on them. For this reason, concentrate on the importance of classification skills and not the actual identity of the rocks that your students find. Note: If your students want to learn more about their rocks, encourage them to use the Internet, field guides and other sources to discover more information about rocks and their properties.

This should become a team exercise where your student groups might each develop and write a hypothesis, list the materials they would use, the number of each item, and a procedure. An excellent way to assess this activity is to have the teams repeat each other's experiment to see if they achieve the same results. This will also replicate the real world challenges facing a research scientist.

Challenging Your Students to Be Problem Solvers:

To make this experiment more challenging to your students, you might just want to pose a question or problem such as: Design and conduct an investigation to determine what 4 square meter location in the Wildlands will produce the greatest variety of rocks. Determine the number and types of rocks found by digging a thirty cubic centimeter hole in the north, east, south, and west sides of the Wildlands. Conduct an experiment to compare the types of rocks found in the Wildlands to those found in your own backyard. What location in the Wildlands will produce the largest variety of rocks? Design and conduct an experiment to determine if there is a relationship between the location where a rock is found and its rock group.

Needed Materials: Ziploc bags to collect rock samples (one per student), magnifying lens for each group, hardness kit (penny, fingernail, glass, and steel nail), one magnet per group, spring scales, box of rock samples, four spades or hand spades if digging a hole is necessary.

Safety Rule: Remind students to be careful when using glass and steel nails in the hardness test.

Procedure:

Student Information: The following information will provide you with the steps for conducting your rock collection and identification exploration. Your teacher will divide you into four groups. Each group will be assigned a different area of the Wildlands. For example, the parking lot, playground, and/or baseball field or the north, south, east, or west sides of the Wildlands. You are to collect as many different types of rocks as you can from your assigned area. This step may take you anywhere from 15 to 20 minutes. Back in the classroom, each group will classify rocks by hardness, color, luster, magnetism, weight, and the type of rock.

Procedural Steps for Conducting the Investigation

1. Your teacher will divide your class into 4 groups for rock collection. NOTE: To help clarify the amount and variety of data you may want to collect, create a data table before beginning the experiment.

2. Your group will be assigned a north, east, west, or south side of the Wildlands to explore. Your teacher may also want your group explore such places as your playground equipment area, parking lot, ball field, prairie, woods, and/or backyards.

3. At your location, set up a four-square meter area (this would be represented by a square that is two meters on a side). Look for as many different rock varieties as you can find in your assigned area. NOTE: If you are having no luck at the surface you may choose to dig a thirty cubic centimeter hole as an alternative.

4. After 15 - 20 minutes (the task in #3 may take longer if a hole must be dug), go back into the classroom and separate your rocks into their various groups by using the rock classification tools and the sample rock kits.

5. Discuss the various rock groups (sedimentary, metamorphic, and igneous) that your rocks belong to and the possible origins of your rocks. Use the Internet and other resources to learn more about the origins of rocks and rock layers in the area where the Wildlands and neighborhood are located. NOTE: Gravity and wind/water erosion have played a big role in distributing rocks in many areas.

6. Make a chart of rock classification properties you plan to explore such as: color, hardness, luster, texture, streak, layering, magnetism, and/or specific gravity. Once again, a variety of resources such as the Internet, field guides, and textbooks may help you design your chart.

7. Use your chart of the rock properties to help you begin testing your collected rocks.

8. To test for luster observe your rocks for shine, dullness, or sparkle. To test for texture you can observe and feel your rocks to see if they are smooth, semi-coarse or coarse. You can also use your observation skills to determine if a rock shows any layering or not. Color can also be determined through observation.

9. To test for hardness students will scratch each rock with the following: fingernail, penny, glass, and a steel nail. Write the hardness value for each item on the board. Fingernail - 2.5 or less, Penny - 3.0 or less, Glass - 5.5 or less, Steel nail - 6.5 or less. This is a difficult test that requires careful observation. It recommended that you also reverse the procedure to see if the rock will scratch the hardness tool as well. You will give the rock a number rating based on which hardness tool, starting from fingernail, was the first to scratch the rock. Record the collected data on your chart.

10. To test for magnetism, each group will bring a magnet near each of their rock samples. Record on your chart whether or not the rock was pulled to the magnet or the magnet stuck to the rock. NOTE: Very few rock types are magnetic.

11. Determining the specific gravity of your rocks can be a real challenge. It requires you to use a spring scale to weigh each of your rock samples in and out of water. You must then divide the weight out of water by the weight in water to get the specific gravity. NOTE: another option is to compare different rock types of the same size by weighing them with a spring scale. Though you are actually measuring the gravitational pull of your rock sample with the spring scale, you can conclude that rocks of the same size have a greater mass if they have a greater weight. (To demonstrate this you can hold a piece of granite and a piece of pumice of the same shape and size in each hand to compare their masses.)

12. Discuss your results and compare your group's chart to other student charts.

Below is a list of questions that can be used to stimulate student discussions. If your students are at a developmental level where you are able to challenge their higher level thinking skills, then only present them with the first set of questions from each group below. Use the second list of questions as a way to stimulate thinking when your students seem unable to expand their knowledge on their own.

Examining Results

Discussion Questions that Require More Critical Thinking Skills:

  • What were your conclusions for this experiment?
  • What could you infer based on your conclusions?
  • How would you design this experiment differently the next time?

Discussion Questions that Require Less Critical Thinking Skills

  • Where in the schoolyard did you find the largest variety of rock groups and types?
  • Did your results match those of the other teams?
  • Did the area you investigated affect the type of rock found?
  • Which rock type was the most prevalent? Why do you think this is true?
  • How do you think those particular rocks got to your collection location?

Rock Links

Diamond Dan Publications

The Mineral and Gemstone Kingdom Complete information guide to rocks, minerals, and gemstones.

Rocks and Minerals A collection of sites about rocks and minerals

Enchanted Rock Some information about Enchanted Rock State park

Rockdoctors 2000 This site will provide you with basic information needed to identify common rocks and minerals.

Mineral Information Finder Find information about rocks, minerals, and mining at this site.

More links to Schoolyard Habitat Information

Schoolyard Habitat Links Learn more about developing and maintaining schoolyard and backyard habitats by visiting these links.

This activity was adapted from a lesson created for

by Debbie Row.  An on-line version can be found @  http://web.stclair.k12.il.us/splashd/rockexp.htm