Download Earth Science with Mr. Lanik Study Guide for Semester 2 Final Exam

Earth Science with Mr. Lanik
Study Guide for Semester 2 Final Exam
June, 2016
Hi. I hope that you aren’t too stressed out about final exams in general, or the Earth
Science exam in particular. I have prepared these notes to help you to understand which
topics will be covered on the exam, and how you should go about studying for the
exam. The most important pieces of information for you to keep in mind as you get
ready for the exam are that a) the exam is open-note, and b) you will need to take time to
organize your notes prior to the exam in order to do well on the exam. The questions
and comments on this study guide are intended to let you know what I think are the
most important Earth Science ideas that you’ve learned over the past 5 months. By the
time you sit down to take the exam, you should be able to come up with a quality
response to EACH of the items listed in this study guide. That is your goal while you
prepare for the mid-term exam.
Please use the following guide to help you prepare your notes for the exam. As you
work through each topic, create a new page of notes that summarizes the important
ideas and information about that topic. Use the notes, activities, websites, and
assignments from the semester to help summarize each subject. Once you have worked
through this study guide and organized a new set of notes based on the study guide,
you should arrange them in your binder so that you can find the information quickly
and easily when you sit down to take the exam. In addition to these notes, you should
also bring the rest of our work from the semester with you in case you want to look it
over during the test—just be sure to organize it all so that you don’t get lost trying to use
it on the exam.
Please note that preparing and bringing notes (using this guide) will give you a boost
of up to 10 points on your Final Exam score!!! These points will be earned only if you
prepare and write out new notes (you need to do more than just organize previous
notes from the semester).
Remember, I am confident that you learned a lot this semester, and that you can
demonstrate what you’ve learned on this exam. And if you get stressed or anxious
while working on the exam, remember to take deep breathes and relax… it’s all gonna
work out just fine in the long run. Trust me on that. Good luck!!!!
Energy and the Greenhouse Effect:
What is “energy”? List some typical forms of energy.
What is “energy conservation”?
What are the three forms of heat energy
Using a burning woodstove as a source of heat, provide a real example of how the wood
stove uses each of the three forms of heat energy to heat the room.
What special heating and cooling property does water have? Why is it cooler near the
ocean than it is inland during the summer?
Describe the process that stars like our Sun use to produce their energy.
Describe the electromagnetic radiation that travels from the Sun to the Earth.
Make a sketch that demonstrates what happens to solar energy that reaches the Earth.
Compare the heating and cooling of water, a dark-colored soil, and a light-colored soil.
What are the three major greenhouse gases? Which one is primarily responsible for
global climate change over the past 150 years?
What specific experiments have scientists performed that have allowed them to study
the past 800,000 years of the chemistry of the atmosphere? Where did the scientists go to
collect the data that they needed?
What is the difference between climate and weather?
How do greenhouse gases in the atmosphere cause the atmosphere to warm? Be
specific. Describe how the energy leaving the Earth is different from the energy that
reaches the Earth, and explain how greenhouse gases are invisible to some types of
energy, but absorb other forms of energy.
The Carbon Cycle:
Be able to identify a source of carbon in each of the four spheres of the Earth (biosphere,
hydrosphere, lithosphere, atmosphere).
Be able to describe how carbon can move from each sphere to any of the other three
spheres.
How does increasing the amount of carbon in the atmosphere impact the ocean?
What is a carbon sink?
The History of the Universe:
How old is the Universe? How old is the Earth?
What happened in the Big Bang?
What first appeared around 300 million years after the Big Bang?
How do small atoms like helium, carbon, nitrogen, and silicon form?
How do larger atoms like gold and uranium form?
What is our solar system made from?
What makes Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars different from Jupiter and Saturn (besides
their distances from the Sun)?
Heavier, denser chemicals in the Earth sank to the planet’s center while it was still molten.
Why do we find heavy metals like gold and lead in the Earth’s crust today?
How did the development of life on the Earth impact the atmosphere?
Plate Tectonics and the Rock Cycle:
What is the theory of plate tectonics?
How does the theory of plate tectonics explain why the Earth’s surface has the features
that it does?
How are convergent boundaries, divergent boundaries, and transform boundaries
different from each other?
Make a sketch of a subduction zone, and show the types of geologic features that are
found near subduction zones.
Make a sketch of a divergent boundary, and show the types of geologic features that are
found near divergent boundaries.
Make a sketch of a transform boundary, and show the types of geologic features that are
found near transform boundaries.
Describe how an intrusive igneous rock differs from an extrusive igneous rock.
Give a specific example of an event in Maine’s past that created igneous rocks found
today in Maine. State when this event happened, and which plate movements caused
the rock to form.
Give a specific example of an event in Maine’s past that created metamorphic rocks
found today in Maine. State when this event happened, and which plate movements
caused the rock to form.
Give a specific example of an event in Maine’s past that created sedimentary rocks
found today in Maine. State when this event happened, and which plate movements
caused the rock to form.
Make a sketch that details the specific transformations that form the rock cycle. On the
sketch, indicate how specific plate boundaries can produce each type of rock.