Geology 101: Intro to Studying Rocks

Learners will enter the beautiful and exciting world of rocks and minerals in this one-time course designed to give young people a basic understanding of what lies beneath their feet.

It may look like boring dirt, but if you look a little closer, you’ll find that there are some mesmerizingly beautiful substances on the Earth’s surface, down below making up the Earth’s crust, and making up lake, river, and ocean beds.

We’ll look at what defines a mineral, find out what rocks are made of and explore the 3 ways rocks are formed, and take a look at how geologists go about identifying various rocks and minerals. If there’s time at the end of class we’ll play a rock identification game!

Class time will be organized as follows:

1) Introductions & Class Rules
2) What are minerals? What are rocks?
3) Igneous Formation Process
4) Sedimentary Formation Process 
5) Metamorphic Formation Process
6) Identifying Rocks & Minerals
7) Game

I’ll stop to ask questions throughout to check for understanding. I like to encourage student engagement and participation by leading learners and giving them a chance to get to the answers on their own based on what they already know. I always welcome questions and comments. We’ll look at images of rocks and minerals as examples and I’ll show examples of specimens from my own collection to enhance class as well. 

I hope this course causes learners to pause and look down every now and again in search of a neat rock, and that it encourages their curiosity about this topic and others like it. Be sure to check out my other courses on this topic! See you in class!