EARTH SCIENCE STUDY GUIDE 2026/2027 QUESTIONS
AND SOLUTIONS RATED A+
✔✔Shield Volcanoes - ✔✔- quiet erruptions
- lava from crater
- flows onto Earth, cools into igneous rock
- lava flow --> large volcanic mountain
- Mauna Loa in Hawaii = shield volcano
✔✔Cinder-cone volcanoes - ✔✔- explosive eruptions
- lava droplets - cool and harden into cinders and ash
- form steep cone hill
- small, form rapidly
✔✔Composite volcanoes - ✔✔- bulit by lava flows & ash/cinder
Mt. Fuji in Japan
Mt. St. Helens in WA
Mt. Vesuvius in Italy
✔✔Lava cools - ✔✔igneous rock
✔✔Intrusive rock - ✔✔-igneous rock
-formed below Earth's surface
-batholiths
-Sierra Nevada Mts.
✔✔Extrusive rock - ✔✔-igeneous rock
-formed at Earth's surface
✔✔Dikes - ✔✔- old lava tubes formed when magma entered vertical fracture &
hardened
✔✔Sill - ✔✔- magma btwn rock layers
- thin sheet
✔✔Laccolith - ✔✔-thicker than a sill
-doesn't flow easily
-pools & makes a surface dome
✔✔Caldera - ✔✔- formed by the collapse of the top of a volcano
- empties magma chamber
- forms a caldera/crater
✔✔3 Types of Rocks - ✔✔- sedimentary
- igneous
, - metamorphic
✔✔Sedimentary rocks - ✔✔- lithification
- fluid sediments --> solid rocks
- compaction, compress sediments
- cementation -->sediments -->sedimentary rock
- fossils wahhaha
✔✔Metamorphic rocks - ✔✔- high temps & pressure
- metamorphism
- new & diff minerals b/c of chemical reactions with heated water/dissolved minerals
- foliated (leaflike) & unfoliated
- foliated = compressed parallel bands of minerals (striped)
- slate, schist, gneiss = foliated/striped
- quartzite, marble (unfoliated/not banded)
✔✔Igneous Rocks - ✔✔- made from molten rock
- molten rock = magma
- when magma cools --> form crystals
- more slowly cools = larger crystals
- obsidian = glassy texture, cools b4 crystals can form
✔✔Minerals - ✔✔-natural, nonliving
- definite chemical composition
-crystalline structure
- ores (mined)
- rocks (made of 1+ minerals)
✔✔Cirques - ✔✔-remains of glacial sources
- frost wedges the rock at bottom of glacier
✔✔Ice Age - ✔✔- glaciers advanced over large portion of the continent
- 2-3 million years ago
- plate tectonics
- changes in Earth/Sun's axis
✔✔Fossilization - ✔✔-
✔✔Deposition - ✔✔- sedimentation
- material deposited from 1 area to another
✔✔Types of weathering (2) - ✔✔- physical weathering
- rocks are broken down into smaller rocks, no chem change - exfoliation
- chemical weathering (water, O2, CO2 make it happen)
- weak acid breaks down rocks
AND SOLUTIONS RATED A+
✔✔Shield Volcanoes - ✔✔- quiet erruptions
- lava from crater
- flows onto Earth, cools into igneous rock
- lava flow --> large volcanic mountain
- Mauna Loa in Hawaii = shield volcano
✔✔Cinder-cone volcanoes - ✔✔- explosive eruptions
- lava droplets - cool and harden into cinders and ash
- form steep cone hill
- small, form rapidly
✔✔Composite volcanoes - ✔✔- bulit by lava flows & ash/cinder
Mt. Fuji in Japan
Mt. St. Helens in WA
Mt. Vesuvius in Italy
✔✔Lava cools - ✔✔igneous rock
✔✔Intrusive rock - ✔✔-igneous rock
-formed below Earth's surface
-batholiths
-Sierra Nevada Mts.
✔✔Extrusive rock - ✔✔-igeneous rock
-formed at Earth's surface
✔✔Dikes - ✔✔- old lava tubes formed when magma entered vertical fracture &
hardened
✔✔Sill - ✔✔- magma btwn rock layers
- thin sheet
✔✔Laccolith - ✔✔-thicker than a sill
-doesn't flow easily
-pools & makes a surface dome
✔✔Caldera - ✔✔- formed by the collapse of the top of a volcano
- empties magma chamber
- forms a caldera/crater
✔✔3 Types of Rocks - ✔✔- sedimentary
- igneous
, - metamorphic
✔✔Sedimentary rocks - ✔✔- lithification
- fluid sediments --> solid rocks
- compaction, compress sediments
- cementation -->sediments -->sedimentary rock
- fossils wahhaha
✔✔Metamorphic rocks - ✔✔- high temps & pressure
- metamorphism
- new & diff minerals b/c of chemical reactions with heated water/dissolved minerals
- foliated (leaflike) & unfoliated
- foliated = compressed parallel bands of minerals (striped)
- slate, schist, gneiss = foliated/striped
- quartzite, marble (unfoliated/not banded)
✔✔Igneous Rocks - ✔✔- made from molten rock
- molten rock = magma
- when magma cools --> form crystals
- more slowly cools = larger crystals
- obsidian = glassy texture, cools b4 crystals can form
✔✔Minerals - ✔✔-natural, nonliving
- definite chemical composition
-crystalline structure
- ores (mined)
- rocks (made of 1+ minerals)
✔✔Cirques - ✔✔-remains of glacial sources
- frost wedges the rock at bottom of glacier
✔✔Ice Age - ✔✔- glaciers advanced over large portion of the continent
- 2-3 million years ago
- plate tectonics
- changes in Earth/Sun's axis
✔✔Fossilization - ✔✔-
✔✔Deposition - ✔✔- sedimentation
- material deposited from 1 area to another
✔✔Types of weathering (2) - ✔✔- physical weathering
- rocks are broken down into smaller rocks, no chem change - exfoliation
- chemical weathering (water, O2, CO2 make it happen)
- weak acid breaks down rocks
