Download Name: June Proficiency Exam Study Guide 7th Grade Science

Name: _________________________
June Proficiency Exam Study Guide
7th Grade Science – Miss Maxwell & Mr. Burgmeyer
Final Exam Dates: Wed 6/10 & Thurs 6/11
Chapter 14: Earth’s Changing Surface
Lesson 1 Plate Tectonics (pages 500 - 506)
Lesson 2 Earthquakes and Volcanoes (pages 508 - 516)
Lesson 3 Weathering, Erosion, and Deposition (pages 518 - 525)
1. What evidence did Wegener use to try to prove his continental drift
hypothesis? Fossil Evidence: tropical plant fossils found in Antarctica
Geological Evidence: matching rock structures
2. What causes the movement of tectonic plates? Convection currents
in the mantle
3. Complete the table below
Movement of Plates
Convergent
Divergent
Transform
Landforms/Events
plates move towards each
Volcanoes
other
plates move away from
Volcanoes
each other
plates slide past each other
earthquakes
What is a volcano? A weak spot in the crust where magma comes to the
surface
Physical
Weathering
4. Complete the Venn Diagram
Chemical
Weathering
below


Process of breaking
down rocks and
minerals without
changing their
composition.
Examples: freezing and
thawing, roots
Process
that breaks
down rocks,
changing
Earth’s
surface
over time

Process that changes the
composition of the rocks
and soil due to exposure
to the environment

Examples: acid rain,
rusting, gases in the
atmosphere
What are the components of soil? Weathered rock, mineral material,
organic matter, air, water; hundreds to thousands of years
5. Where do the nutrients in soil come from? Organic material is broken
down
6. What was Wegener’s initial hypothesis? Why didn’t scientists accept
it? What eventually caused them to change their minds? What is the
Theory of Plate Tectonics? Wegener’s hypothesis stated that the
continents have slowly moved to their current locations. Wegener’s
hypothesis was rejected because he could not provide a reason as to
how the continents move. His hypothesis was finally approved after
the concept of sea-floor spreading was discovered. The Theory of
Plate Tectonics states that Earth’s crust is broken into rigid plates that
move slowly over Earth’s surface.
Chapter 6: The Environment and Change Over Time
Lesson 1 Fossil Evidence of Evolution (pages 192-200)
7. What is the fossil record? All the fossils ever discovered on Earth
8. What are fossils? Preserved remains or traces of living things
9. From largest to smallest, what is the correct order of the divisions of
time of the Geological Time Scale?
a. Periods, eras, eons
c. Eons, eras, periods
c. Periods, eons, eras
d. Eras, periods, eons
10. Complete the table below
Fossil
Mineralization
Carbonization
Definition
Minerals in the water replace
the organism’s original material
and harden into a rock
A fossil forms when a dead
organism is compressed over
time and pressure drives off the
organism’s liquids and gases,
only the carbon outline or film
remains.
Example
petrified wood
outline of a fern found
in a rock
Molds and
Casts
Trace Fossils
Original
Material
Mold: impression of an organism
impression of a shell in
in a rock
mud that has
Cast: fossil copy of an organism
hardened
in a rock
Preserved evidence of the
foot print
activity of an organism
Original tissue of organisms are
buried in the absence of oxygen baby mammoth found
for long periods of time become
in a glacier
fossilized
11. Explain how scientists date fossils. What is relative-age dating? What is
absolute-age dating? What type of rocks are fossils found in? Where
are the youngest rocks found? the oldest rocks? Relative age dating
is when scientists determine if a rock is either older or younger than
rocks nearby. Scientists determine the relative order in which rock
layers were deposited. Absolute age dating is more precise than
relative-age dating; scientists use radioactive decay, a natural
clocklike process in rocks to learn its age in years. Fossils are found in
sedimentary rocks. The oldest rocks are found further down in the
earth and the younger rocks are found closest to Earth’s surface.
Weather and Climate
Chapter 16: Earth’s Atmosphere (pages 572-594)
Chapter 17: Weather (pages 612 – 639)
Chapter 18: Climate (pages 648 – 675)
12. How is weather different from climate? Weather is the atmospheric
conditions, along with short-term changes, of a certain place at a
certain time. Examples: its raining and cloud outside, it snowed 4
inches last night. Climate is the long-term average wether conditions
that occur in a particular region, Examples: it rains 18 inches per year
in this area
13. What are the factors that affect weather? Wind, air temperature,
humidity, air pressure, precipitation
14. How does air move? areas of high pressure to areas of low pressure
15. Complete the table below
Type of Air Mass
Temperature
Humidity
Continental Polar
Cold
Dry
Maritime Polar
Cold
wet
Continental Tropical
Warm
Dry
Maritime Tropical
Warm
wet
16. What is a front? Boundary where two different air masses meet
17. The Coriolis Effect explains why winds curve to the right in the Northern
Hemisphere, and to the left in the Southern Hemisphere.
18. Global winds are caused by Unequal heating of Earth’s atmosphere
19. What are the Doldrums? Calm, windless areas
20. What global wind belt is responsible for weather in the United States?
Prevailing Westerlies
21. True or False – An increase in world populations is evidence of climate
change.
22. Name all of the layers of the atmosphere and provide an example of
what can be found in each layer. (be sure to include the exosphere)
Troposphere: surface-weather
Stratosphere: ozone layer, airplane fly
Mesosphere: meteors
Thermosphere: satellites
Ionosphere: Auroras
Exosphere: space-no definite end