Grade 7 · Science · Unit 12 of 14
Rocks & Minerals
The rock cycle
What your child practises
Rocks and minerals, describing minerals (lustre, hardness), the three main kinds of rock, the rock cycle, weathering and erosion and how mountains form.
Alberta Curriculum learning outcome: Unit E: Planet Earth · rocks and minerals, the rock cycle, weathering and erosion and mountain building
Sample questions
A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.
Question 1
What is weathering?
- The moving of sediment by water
- The breaking down of rock into smaller pieces
- The formation of a fossil
- The melting of rock inside Earth
Show answer
The breaking down of rock into smaller pieces
Hint: Weathering breaks; erosion carries away.
Question 2
Which type of rock is most likely to contain fossils?
- Igneous rock
- Metamorphic rock formed by great heat
- Lava
- Sedimentary rock
Show answer
Sedimentary rock
Hint: Hot magma would destroy remains. Sediments bury them gently.
Question 3
Igneous, sedimentary or metamorphic? Sort each rock.
Sort into: 🌋 igneous · 🏖️ sedimentary · 🔥 metamorphic
- 🪨coal
- 🪨pumice
- 🪨quartzite
- 🪨marble
- 🪨obsidian
- 🪨sandstone
Show answer
🌋 igneous: pumice, obsidian · 🏖️ sedimentary: coal, sandstone · 🔥 metamorphic: quartzite, marble
Hint: Igneous rock forms from cooled magma or lava. Sedimentary rock forms from layers of sediment pressed together. Metamorphic rock is changed by heat and pressure.
Question 4
The Rocky Mountains have layers of rock that are bent and folded. What probably caused the folding?
- Rivers pushing rock upward
- Rain filling the valleys
- Huge forces squeezing Earth's crust over a very long time
- Wind blowing for a year
Show answer
Huge forces squeezing Earth's crust over a very long time
Hint: Fold mountains form when crust is pushed together.
Question 5
On the Mohs scale of hardness, which mineral is hardest?
- Calcite
- Talc
- Quartz
- Diamond
Show answer
Diamond
Hint: Talc is 1 and diamond is 10.
Question 6
In the rock cycle, what happens to a metamorphic rock that melts completely?
- It is destroyed forever
- It becomes a fossil
- It always becomes sediment at once
- It can cool again and become an igneous rock
Show answer
It can cool again and become an igneous rock
Hint: The rock cycle has no beginning or end.