Download Grade 4 NGSS Science Plate Tectonics 4 ES 2.1

Richland Science Lab
Grade: 4th
Experiment: Graham Cracker Plate Tectonics
Question: How are landforms (mountains, volcanos, oceanic trenches)
formed?
Standards:
4-ESS2-2 Analyze and interpret data from maps to describe patterns of Earth’s
features.
ESS2.B Plate tectonics and Large-Scale System Interactions: The locations of
mountain ranges, deep ocean trenches, ocean floor structures, earthquakes, and
volcanos occur in patterns. Most earthquakes and volcanoes occur in bands that
are often along the boundaries between continents and oceans. Major mountain
chains form inside continents or near their edges. Maps can help locate the
different land and water features areas of Earth.
Duration: 50 minutes
Lesson Components
Engage/Explain
Explain/Explore
Estimated Time
10 minutes
10 minutes
Brief Description
Discuss plate tectonics
and how there are plates
in the lithosphere that
are constantly moving.
Show Pangea, what the
Earth looked like 200
million years ago
Divergent Plate
Boundaries spread apart.
Show example in Iceland
and recreate with
graham crackers and
frosting.
Explain/Explore
15 minutes
Explain/Explore
10 minutes
Evaluate
5 minutes
Convergent Plate
Boundaries collide.
Explain there are 3
different types. Review 2
of them and how they
formed the Andes and
the Himalayas. Recreate
with graham crackers,
rice cakes, water, and
frosting.
Transform Plate
Boundaries slide against
each other causing
earthquakes. Model
using graham crackers
and frosting.
Have students test their
knowledge by asking
questions about the
different types of
boundaries. If teachers
allow, students may eat
the graham crackers.
Advance Preparation:
Check to see if anyone has an allergy to the ingredients in graham crackers, rice
cakes and frosting.
If a student has allergies, an option for this lab would be to use soft play dough
and cardboard cut into rectangles.
Buy Graham Crackers, rice cakes, and White frosting. May want to offer gluten
free graham crackers for those who have an allergy.
Materials Needed: Items may be placed on tray before lesson or may
be passed individually for each plate boundary demonstration.
Procedure has items passed out individually.
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Paper plates (1 per child)
Graham Crackers (2 per student)
White Frosting
Rice Cakes (1/2 per student)
Markers
Knife for spreading frosting
Small cup of water for each table
For instructor:
 Power Point Presentation (Plate Tectonics)
 Computer or tablet
 Projector
Procedure: (Suggested dialog in bold)
Engage/Explain (10 minutes)
Today we will be learning about plate tectonics. Show PowerPoint
slide 1. The Earth’s lithosphere, the rigid outer shell of Earth,
consisting of the crust and upper mantle, is made up of a 15 major
plates. Show PP Slide 2. These plates are resting atop the hot plastic
upper mantle, known as the asthenosphere. These plates may
converge or collide, diverge (or separate) or slide past each other.
Show PP slide 3. The seven large plates are the African, North American,
South American, Eurasian, Australian, Antarctic, and Pacific plates.
There are also several minor plates. All of these plates are moving in
different directions and at different speeds.
Show PP slide 4. Point to the top right picture. This is what Earth looked like
200 Million years ago. Scientists call this version of Earth, Pangea.
Let’s look at how Earth has changed in the past 200 Million years.
Have students point out what continents have moved in each of the pictures.
These plates continue to move today. Some say at a rate of 2-10
centimeters per year, or about how fast your fingernails grow. With
the person next to you discuss what you think the Earth will look like
in 40 million years and 200 million years from now. Give students a
minute to discuss.
Show PP Slide 5. There are 3 types of boundaries where the plates
touch. They are divergent, convergent, and transform boundaries.
Explain/Explore (10 minutes)
Show PP Slide 6. Divergent plate boundaries spread apart. Show
movement with your hands. Have students copy movement while
saying divergent. When the plates move apart it allows magma to
come up through the crust. Under the water, the magma cools and
creates mountains. Show PP slide 7. The North American plate and the
Eurasian plate have divergent boundaries that are spreading. When
the plates spread, it allows magma to be released from the Earth.
There is a large under water mountain range called the Mid-Atlantic
ridge that has formed from magma. This ridge extends from the Arctic
Ocean to southern tip of Africa. Iceland is divided along these two
plates. On land, the divergent boundaries create volcanos, so when
magma is released it flows up through volcanos to become lava.
Iceland has 8 active volcanos as seen on the map.
In the middle of your table, you will see a plate and a marker for each
of you. Using the marker, divide your plate into 4 sections. Using
graham crackers and frosting, we are going to show how a divergent
plate boundary works. You may not eat our “plates” and “magma”.
Once you get your graham cracker square, please break it in two.
Someone will also becoming around to place frosting, or magma, in
one of your sections. Have one volunteer pass out a graham cracker square
out to each student, and one volunteer place a spoonful of frosting in the middle
of one section.
One of your graham cracker rectangle is representing the North
American plate. Please hold that one in the air. Your other one is the
Eurasian plate. Now we are going to make the Mid Atlantic Ridge.
Lay the two pieces of graham cracker side by side on top of the
frosting so they are touching. To imitate the result of diverging
oceanic plates, press down on the crackers as you slowly pull apart in
opposite directions.
Show PP Slide 8.With the person next to you talk about what
happened to the frosting between the crackers?
What type of feature is produced by this movement? Call on a couple of
students to answer these questions after they’ve talked with their partner.
Let’s learn about convergent boundaries now. Please push your plate
to the center of the table, out of reach, and look back at me.
Explain/Explore (15 minutes)
Show PP Slide 9. Convergent plate boundaries collide together. Show
movement with hands. Have students follow your hand movements
while saying convergent. There are three types of convergent plate
boundaries. They are oceanic – continental, continental – continental
and oceanic-oceanic.
Show PP Slide 10. First we are going to concentrate on oceanic continental boundaries. This is where the oceanic crust collides with a
continental crust, or land. When these plates collide, the oceanic
plate will move under the continental plate, this is called subduction.
This forms trenches in the ocean. There are usually steep mountain
ranges and large volcanos at the edge of the continent and
earthquakes are common.
Show PP slide 11. An oceanic-continental convergent plate can be
found between Nazca Plate and the South American plate. These
colliding plates form the Andes in South America. The Andes are a
mountain range that is 4,500 miles long and is in 7 different countries.
Notice how many volcanos are present along the mountain range.
In another section of your plate, we are going to see what happens
when a graham cracker, or the oceanic plate, meets a rice cake, or the
continental plate. Have a volunteer pass out ½ rice cake & ½ graham cracker
square. Hold up your oceanic plate (a graham cracker). Notice that it a
thin but dense plate. Good put that down and hold up your
continental plate (a rice cake). It is thicker but less dense. Place the
graham cracker and rice cake so they are almost touching, end to end,
on top of the frosting. Push the two “plates” slowly toward each
other and observe which plate rides up over the other. On the actual
surface of the Earth, the oceanic plate is subducted. Does anyone
remember what subduction is? Call on one or two students. Subduction
is when one plate is forced under another plate.
Talk with your partner about the following questions: Show PP slide 12
. Why does the oceanic plate sink beneath the continental plate?
. What features are formed on the continent along this boundary?
What feature is formed in the ocean along the subduction zone?
After students talk with the person next to them, ask these questions to the
whole class and call on a few people to answer.
We are moving on to Continental-Continental Convergent Plates.
Please push your graham cracker plate to the center of the table and
look at me.
Show PP slide 13 Continent-continent convergence creates some of
the world’s largest mountains ranges. Since the continental
landmasses have the same rock density, one plate could not be
subducted under the other. Magma cannot penetrate this thick crust,
so there are no volcanoes, although the magma stays in the crust.
With enormous slabs of crust smashing together, continent-continent
collisions bring on numerous and large earthquakes. Show PP slide 14.
A good example of a large mountain range caused by a two
continental plates colliding is the Himalayas. The Himalayas were
formed 40-50 Million years ago when the Indian Plate collided with
the Eurasian Plate. Does anyone know the name of the Earth’s
highest mountain which happens to be in the Himalayas? Mt. Everest.
In April 2015, a 7.8 earthquake shook Nepal and triggered an
avalanche on Mt. Everest.
Let’s show what happens with our graham crackers when two
continental plates converge or collide. Have a volunteer pass out one
graham cracker square. Have students break in two. Place shallow cup of water
on desk. 2-3 students can share a cup.
Take two new graham crackers. Each piece of graham cracker
represents a continental plate.
Dip one end of each of the two graham crackers into a cup of water.
Don’t wait too long or they will fall apart.
Immediately remove the crackers and lay them end to end on the
frosting with the wet edges nearly touching.
Slowly push the two crackers together.
With a person at your table discuss: show PP slide15
 What happens to the wet ends of the graham crackers?
 What feature do the resulting ends of the wet crackers
represent?
 Name a specific location on the Earth where this type of
boundary activity takes place.
Call on a few students to answer these questions with the whole
class.
Explain/Explore (10 minutes)
Show PP slide 16. Transform boundaries are the last type of plate
boundaries. The plates slide past each other in opposite directions.
Show motion with hands. Transform boundaries cause massive
earthquakes because they are where large slabs of lithosphere slide
past each other. Show PP slide 17. The San Andreas Fault in California
is famous for all the earthquakes it’s caused, big and small. Perhaps,
you saw the movie San Andreas which was a fictional portrayal of a
massive earthquake. Keep in mind that an earthquake could happen
along this fault but it would not be as destructive as what’s shown in
the movie.
Have a volunteer pass out graham cracker squares. Have students break in half.
Take two graham cracker pieces and lay the two pieces side by side on
top of the frosting so they are touching.
Place one hand on each of the graham cracker pieces and push them
together by applying steady, moderate pressure. At the same time,
also push one of the pieces away from you while pulling the other
toward you.
* If you do this correctly, the cracker should hold while you increase the
push-pull pressure, but will finally break from the opposite forces. We
found this one the most difficult to model accurately.
With the person next to you discuss: Show PP slide 18
 Name a specific location on the Earth where this type of
boundary activity takes place.
 What is the direction of plate motion at a transform plate
boundary?
 Why are transform faults on continents prone to massive
earthquakes?
 Why do you think Earthquakes typically occur in California and
not in the midwest?
Call on a few students to answer these questions whole group.
Evaluate (5 minutes)
Which types of boundary plates form volcanos?
-divergent, oceanic-continental convergent
Which types of boundary plates form mountains?
-divergent, convergent
Which types of boundary plates cause earthquakes?
-divergent, convergent, transform
Assuming teacher allows, students may eat their plate boundary types
(the graham crackers).
Have students throw away plates and uneaten graham crackers.
Terminology:
Plate Tectonics – a theory that the Earth’s crust (lithosphere) is broken into
plates.
Divergent Boundaries - where plates spread apart
Convergent Boundaries – plates collide
Transform Boundaries – plates slide past each other in opposite directions.
Lithosphere - the rigid outer shell of Earth, consisting of the crust and upper
mantle
Asthenosphere - hot plastic upper mantle
Lesson Idea from Eva Varga – add website