Topic: Rocks

Grade Level: 2nd

Lesson 1: Three Rocks

Objectives: Observe and define characteristics

of rocks

1. Students will be able to generate and use adjectives to describe the characteristics of rocks

2. Students will be able to predict and investigate what happens when two rocks are rubbed together

Engage

The students will be gathered and presented a bag of rocks. The rocks are of different shapes, color, and
other characteristics. The teacher will ask the questions to access their prior knowledge of rocks. Some
of the questions include:

 Who can tell me what these objects are?

 Have you seen any of these rocks before? If so where have you seen them?
 Where can you find rocks?
 Are all of these items rocks?
 How are they alike/different?

The students will share their experiences with rocks in the past and their observations of the rocks that
they see in front of them.

Explore

Students will be grouped into pairs and each pair will be given their own bag of rocks. With a partner,
the students will have five to ten minutes to observe the rocks in their bag.

Students will record their observations in their science journals. Using these observations, the pair will
try to list general characteristics of rocks. The students will try to define what a rock is.

Explain
The teacher will ask the class for the characteristics they observed for each type of rock. The teacher will
write their answers on the board and have the class write down the class list. The teacher will also ask
for the students' answers to the questions in the Explore section. The teacher will ask what the students
learned from the story they heard this morning that supports their ideas.

The teacher will then write the definitions on the board and have the students copy them

down in their journals. The definitions are:

1. Igneous Rocks: Hot rocks or melted rocks that are found in volcanoes and inside the

Earth; rock formed by the solidification of molten magma

2. Sedimentary Rocks: Cool, wet, or fossil rocks that are found in rivers, oceans and lakes; rock formed
from consolidated clay sediments

3. Metamorphic Rocks: Changed, squished or "rhinestone" rocks that are found inside the Earth; rock
altered by pressure and heat

Elaborate

The teacher will give the students a worksheet with the name of a rock and some characteristics of the
rock. The students, with their partners, will try to match the rocks in their bags to the rock on the
worksheet. Once they match a rock to the worksheet, they will add one more characteristic to the
worksheet that they think would make identifying the rock easier.

NAME OF ROCK

CHARACTERISTICS

ANC CHA

OBSIDIAN

BLACK, GLASSY
SCORIA

HOLES, RED

GRANITE

BLACK AND WHITE

PUMICE

LIGHT

SANDSTONE

BROWN, SMALL PIECES

CONGLOMERATE LARGE PIECES

SHALE

FLAT

MUDSTONE WITH FOSSILS

SHELLS, MUD

COLORED

CHERT

HARD, REDDISH

BROWN
SERPENTINITE

GREEN, SMOOTH

SCHIST

GRAY, SHINY,

FLAT MINERALS

MARBLE

WHITE, GRAY

Evaluate

Using an exit ticket, the students will list one thing they learned about igneous rocks, sedimentary rocks
and metamorphic rocks. Then the student will write what they think is the best way to sort rocks and
why they think