Sixth Grade Unit 1: Rocks and Minerals

6 Weeks
Unit Description
S6E5 Obtain, evaluate, and communicate information to show how Earth’s surface is
formed.
In this unit, students plan and carry out investigations to learn about rock formation processes, rock
compositions, rock classifications, and mineral characteristics.

Topic 1: Minerals
Big Ideas/Enduring Understandings:
●Many materials used by people come from rocks and minerals.
●Minerals are naturally formed, inorganic solids with a crystalline shape.
●Minerals can be classified based on their color, streak, hardness, luster, cleavage, and fracture
●Rocks are classified based on how they formed and their mineral composition.
Essential Questions:
● What are Earth’s natural resources?
● How are minerals identified?
● How do minerals make up rocks?

Content Standards
S6E5b. Plan and carry out an investigation of the characteristics of minerals and how minerals
contribute to rock contribution.

Description of Key Content:

Teacher Background Information
Misconceptions Proper Conceptions
● Rocks and minerals are the same thing; ● Rocks and minerals are not the same
distinguishing them is not important. thing; rocks are composed of minerals, which
● Humans can fabricate rocks and minerals are naturally existing chemical compounds.
● Rocks and minerals are naturally
● Minerals are not important to my life. occurring substances that are usually crystalline
and solid.
● Almost every product we use in daily life
contains or depends on minerals that have to be
mined.
Instructional Strategies
S6E5b.
When this standard is taught with fidelity, students are planning and carrying out investigations that
allow them to understand the characteristics of minerals. They also focus on the cross-cutting
concepts of Scale, Proportion, and Quantity and Structure and Function. One such way to do this is
through the Mineral Investigations Lesson:

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“You have been hired by the Know-Whin Investment Corporation to determine the value of a mineral
deposit located on a piece of land they are considering buying. The Corporation has supplied you
with six bags of mineral samples their agents have collected from the land. Your task is to determine
the identity of each of the six minerals. Then you will research how valuable each mineral is and
report back to the corporation giving your recommendation about whether they should buy the
land.” (http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/geology/leveson/core/linksa/mineral_invest_intro.html)
Supply students with charts for each of the mineral properties (included in lesson) and allow them to
design tests for each property. They should record their data and identify each mineral. Students will
then research the value of each mineral, run a cost-benefit analysis to determine total profits, and
present their findings to the Know-Whin Company.

As you move on to studying rocks, allow students time to investigate rocks with magnifying glasses to
determine how minerals contribute to rock composition. For example, take a sample of granite and
have students try to identify how many unique minerals they can see in the rock.

Evidence of Learning
By completion of this unit, students will be able to:
● Describe the characteristics of minerals
● Explain that rocks are made of minerals

Additional Assessments:
TBD
Adopted Resources Literature Connections Uncovering Student Ideas
TBD Probes:

Vocabulary
Mineral Inorganic
composition Streak
luster Cleavage

Web Resources
● BrainPOP Movies: Minerals and Crystals
● General information about minerals: http://geology.com/minerals/
● Mineral Classification:
http://utahscience.oremjr.alpine.k12.ut.us/sciber00/7th/classify/sciber/minclas1.htm
Unit Lessons: Additional Lab STEM Challenges/PBLs
Mineral Investigations Activities:
Mineral Investigations – Student Sheet Mineral ID (online)
http://academic.brookl
yn.cuny.edu/geology/le
veson/core/linksa/min
eral_invest_intro.html

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Sample 3-D Performance Task

Topic 2: Rocks and the Rock Cycle

Big Ideas/Enduring Understandings:
●Many materials used by people come from rocks and minerals.
●Rocks are classified based on how they formed and their mineral composition.
●Sedimentary rocks are formed by the ongoing deposition of rocks and other sediments that are
compacted and cemented together.
●Igneous rocks form as magma cools.
●Metamorphic rocks from as rocks undergo heat and pressure.
●Rocks weather, form sediments, get compacted, heated, and recrystallized into new rock. This is
represented in the rock cycle.
Essential Questions:
● How are rocks formed?
● How are rocks classified?
● How can rocks change from one type to another?
Content Standards
S6E5c. Construct an explanation of how to classify rocks by their formation and how rocks change
through geologic processes in the rock cycle.
Misconceptions Proper Conceptions
● All rocks are the same, and it’s hard to ● Rocks can be distinguished in different
tell how they originated. types, based on their origins and compositions
● Rocks and minerals are not the same
● Rocks and minerals are the same thing; thing; rocks are composed of minerals, which are
distinguishing them is not important. naturally existing chemical compounds.
● Humans can fabricate rocks and ● Rocks and minerals are naturally
minerals; artifacts are the same as rocks and occurring substances that are usually crystalline
minerals. and solid.
● The rock cycle only goes one direction. ● Just like the water cycle, a rock can start
in any part of the rock cycle and has multiple
options for how it might change depending on
the environmental conditions.
Instructional Strategies
S6E5c.
When this standard is taught with fidelity, students develop two explanations: one about how to
classify rocks by their formation and one about how rocks change through the rock cycle. Students
can interact with, observe, and research igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic rocks to
understand their characteristics and how they are formed. Students can use the Three Types of Rocks
Graphic Organizer to keep their research organized. It is best to have many samples of the three
types of rocks so that students can touch and see rocks in person and start trying to classify them.
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The “What Done It” PBL Lesson uses this approach. Information about the three types of rocks can be
found here: http://geology.com/rocks/.

Students can research and make models of the processes involved in the rock cycle before writing an
explanation. One way to model the rock cycle is by using the Crayon-Rock-Cycle Lab. Alternatively,
there are many good online simulations as well, such as
https://www.learner.org/interactives/rockcycle/

Crosscutting concepts to discuss include Cause and Effect (how rocks are formed), Stability and
Change, and Systems and System Models (the rock cycle).

After students complete these activities, they need to write their explanations as a summative
assessment. What is a good explanation? “Scientific explanations attempt to answer three questions:
what we know, why it happens, and how we know” (Ogborn, 1988, cited in Osborne and Patterson,
2010). Ask your ELA teacher for graphic organizers or other strategies s/he uses when teaching
explanatory/informational writing that you could implement in your classroom.
Evidence of Learning
By completion of this unit, students will be able to:
● Describe the characteristics of minerals
● Explain how rocks are classified (by their process of formation)
● Explain how rocks are changed in the rock cycle

Additional Assessments:
TBD
Adopted Resources Literature Connections Uncovering Student Idea Probes:
TBD The Magic School Bus: Is it a Rock (Version 2) (Vol. 2)
Inside the Earth Sedimentary Rock Layers (Earth
Science Edition)

Vocabulary:
Rock Rock cycle
Deposition Weathering
Cementation Igneous
Metamorphic Texture
Intrusive/coarse-grained Foliated
Web Resources
● Rocks and Soils
● Superpostion -Class Zone
● Rock Cycle – animations
● Interactive Rock cycle
● Rocks and Layers
● Flash Rock Cycle

Unit Lessons Additional Lab/Lesson STEM Challenges/PBLs

Resources: Asteroid Impact (online)
https://www.teachengineeri
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 Three Types of Rocks Graphic ng.org/curricularunits/view/
Organizer csm_asteroid_tg
Making and Breaking: The Rock What Done It PBL
Cycle (online) What Done It Evidence
https://www.teachengineering.org/ Collection Sheet
lessons/view/cub_rock_lesson02
Crayon-Rock-Cycle

Sample 3-D Performance Task