[shonk4]

I'm doing a big unit on rocks and minerals. Does anyone have any fun ideas? I would also like to do something fun with caves.

Thanks in advance!

[Mrs. O]

I will teach my rocks and minerals unit in April and May. One of the things my kids really like is panning for gemstones. I purchase several gemstones from e-bay. Actually I have always had a parent volunteer to buy them. I put an equal amount of stones in a baggie mixed with sand and small natural aquarium rocks. Each child then gets to rinse their bag and find their stones. We use pie pans with holes and they pour water over it to pan for gemstones.

They also really like breaking geodes that I get from Oriental Trading. Some are better than others, but then we divide the good pieces up evenly after everyone gets a chance to crack one open.

1) Make fossils using play dough or clay.
2) Do a fossil dig by hiding fossils in large sandbox.
3) read the magic school bus into the earth book

[iluv2nd]

writing to quarries and mines around the country and world for samples. We only got a few responses but they were wonderful. One place sent notecards; the others sent samples, letters and lots of brochures and posters. Each child wrote a letter to a different place... I searched the internet for places. I got the idea from another teacher.

Our science kit (FOSS at the time) had lots of fun "experiments." We made sedimentary rock cookies, took apart false rocks we made with a recipe from the kit, and did several other things my feeble, old brain can't remember. I liked this unit a lot. Wish it was part of the second grade curriculum.

[hescollin]

Make edible rocks...helps students see the difference in the three types of rocks. Igneous rocks---melt chocolate chips in microwave, (melted rock or magma) have a piece of wax paper on each desk and put a spoonful of melted chocolate on each wax paper for students to watch it cool and harden. *****Make Gumdrop Metamorphic rocks....Give each student 2 pieces of wax paper, give each student three different colored gum drops (cut into nine or ten pieces)---put the pieces of gum drops between the pieces of wax paper and have the students press the gumdrops together)remove the wax paper and discuss how heat and pressure make metamorphic rocks. Sedimentary Rocks...make and eat Rice Krispies. *****Make pet rocks Students bring a rock about the size of an egg. Use for experiments, do rocks sink or float. Be sure and have at least one rock that floats. Than make their rocks into Pet Rocks (teacher uses super glue ---to glue on two wiggly eyes.) Pet Rocks are their reading buddies and listen to students read. Students must read to their rock fifteen minutes each night to keep their rocks alive (we use this as part of our Book-It reading activity) (******Hard boiled egg cut in half with a red hot candy put in the center of the egg yolk = the different layers of the earth. Shell is the crust and is approximately 6-40 miles, the white represents the mantle and is approximately 1,800 miles, the yolk represents the outer core and is approximately 1,375 miles, the red hot is the very very HOT inner core and is approximately 1,750 miles. Read the book "The Magic School Bus Inside the Earth" this explains the layers of the earth and the composition of each.

[2ndgradeteacher]

If you have access to older editions of the Mailbox Magazine (Primary/2-3) Edition, they had a great unit on Caves in October/November 2002. The unit included directions for making your own caves out of everyday materials, such as bugles and pipe cleaners and other everyday things.

[gaither3]

We teach the Rocks and Minerals units from the Foss unit. It is very fun for the students. They are little detectives and they perform several tests on the rocks and minerals (i.e. vinegar test, hardness test, etc.) that are merely labeled by a letter. At the end, the students are required to look at thier field guides and the results of their tests and use a description card to figure out which rocks/minerals are which.
This is a great unit, and the students love trying to be detectives and figure out which minerals are which.

[Risa]

These are links to sites I've used for my own background information and for teaching the facts to my students. Some of them were used for student research. I especially liked the sites that had animations. Some of the information may be more than you want to cover, but you may find something useful among these.

Rocks For Kids
http://www.rocksforkids.coml

Rocks and Minerals
http://www.ivyhall.district96.k12.il...als/rocks.html

Rocks and Minerals-Good links here
http://edtech.kennesaw.edu/web/rocks.html

Rocks and Minerals-Good links here-North Carolina Site
http://www.learnnc.org/students/4/topics/rocks-4

Rocks and Soils-Interactive game type-Rock Properties
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/science...ks_soils.shtml

Rock Cycle-Static-Diagram
http://www.minsocam.org/MSA/K12/rkcy...ycleindex.html

Rocks and the Rock Cycle
http://www.windows.ucar.edu/tour/lin....html&edu=high

Rocks.Sedimentary Sandwich
http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/rocks/sandwich.shtml

Rocks, Rock Cycle, Properties-'Teachers First' Unit
http://www.teachersfirst.com/lessons/rocks/index.cfm

Rock Cycle-Interactive Animation
http://www.classzone.com/books/earth...0602page02.cfm

Rocks-How do Igneous Rocks form?-Animation
http://www.classzone.com/books/earth...=investigation

Rocks-How do igneous rocks form?
http://www.classzone.com/books/earth...=investigation

Rocks-What kind of rock is this? -Animation
http://www.classzone.com/books/earth...=investigation

Rocks-Plate Tectonics-Break up of Pangea-Animation
http://www.scotese.com/pangeanim.htm

[jensw]

The borax crystal ornaments were fun! We just did those in 5th grade for our rocks and minerals unit.