Download Plate Tectonics WebQuest

Name: ______________
Due Friday – April 10th
(The links below are both listed under Classroom Web Links on my
SchoolWires Page).
Turn into Hand-In saved as 1_Name_Plates
Please answer the questions using another color font.
I. Task One for the day: Go to the following website and work your way
through the pages (please turn the volume on your computer OFF at this
time). It will be much easier for you to complete some of these questions if
you turn to the tectonic plates map in either your green or orange books.
(Orange – 285; Green – 480). I prefer the orange book’s map.
http://www.learner.org/interactives/dynamicearth/structure.html
Earth’s Structure:
1. What are the four layers of the Earth?
2. What part of the Earth makes up the lithosphere?
3. What part of the Earth makes up the asthenosphere?
4. How far would you have to drill into the Earth to reach the inner
core?
Plate Tectonics
5. Click on the picture of the Earth on the left. How long ago did the
Earth look like this?
6. What did Alfred Wegener name the continent that existed long
ago, and what did this word mean in Greek?
7. The plate tectonics theory states that the Earth’s surface is
broken into large slabs called ______________.
8. Under Moving continents, arrange the continents in the
correct
order on the timeline. After you have done this, take a “ScreenShot” of
your computer by hitting Shift+Command+4,
and insert the picture here
so I know you successfully
completed this task.
Plates and Boundaries
9. How many major tectonic plates exist (according to this
website)?
10. Which plate do we live on? (Careful, this one is tough
because two of the plates on the map have little lines).
11. What type of boundary occurs when plates slide past each
other?
12. What type of boundary occurs when plates are pushing
each other?
toward
13. What type of boundary occurs when plates are moving
from each other?
apart
14. Roll your mouse over the key at the bottom of the map.
There is a convergent boundary between what two plates?
There is a divergent boundary between what two plates?
There is a transform boundary between what two plates?
BONUS!!! For ten bonus points, arrange the continental plates
on the
map and take a screen shot again, proving that you
completed the task.
Slip, Slide and Collide
15. What are three features that would form at a convergent
boundary?
16. What are three features that would form at a divergent
boundary?
17. What destructive feature would form at a transform boundary?
II. Task Two: Go to the following website and answer the questions below.
You’ll go through the topics on the left of this page to answer the rest of the
questions below.
http://library.thinkquest.org/17457/platetectonics/1.php
Part 1: Earth's Interior
1. How is Earth's interior like an apple?
2. The lithosphere is divided into 2 parts (or crust). What are they called?
3. What is the thickness of each type of plate?
4. What rocks are each of these plates primarily made of?
5. From the picture on this page, which plate goes under the other one
when they meet?
6. Based on question numbers 4 and 5 (or relying on what we already
know), which type of rock do you believe is more dense? Granite or
Basalt?
7. Name an element in the core of the Earth and tell the core’s
temperature.
Part 2: Continental Drift
8. What was the name of Alfred Wegener’s theory?
9. Why are the tectonic plates moving?
10. Did Wegener know about the reason the plates were moving?
Explain your answer.
11. When magma rises and pulls ocean crust apart, it causes
______________ _______________ (hint: scientists only found out
about it in the 1950’s).
Part 3: The Different Plates
15. How many major plates does this website name? How
this compare to the number of plates listed on the first website?
does
16. Name a difference you see between this website’s plate map and
your book’s plate map.
17. Are these plates lithospheric or asthenospheric plates?
Part 4: Seafloor Spreading
18. Why is the picture on this page of the person in a lot of trouble not
very scientifically accurate?
19. What is the process called as a plate is melted back into the
mantle?
20. How long and how high is the mid-Atlantic Ridge?
21. Where are the youngest rocks on the ocean floor?
Part 5: Subduction
22. In subduction, which plate will be forced under the other one?
23. Does subduction occur at divergent or convergent boundaries?
24. What are two Earth features that form where subduction is
occurring?