Hey guys!

 

So, this is my first blog post that is not about the student blogging challenge. My scimatics (science and math combined) teacher, Mr. Gross asked us to make a book about tectonic plates. My book was about Napoleon and Terrance. They were two twin lamas, who experience a large amount of geological activity in the span of a couple hours. This was super fun to make, so now, I’ll tell you all about it.

 

We started off the project with a MindMap. For those who don’t know, a MindMap is like a tree diagram. You can make branches emanating from the center and from those branches, more branches. In this MindMap, we had to ask ourselves some questions. Here were mine.

1 does gravity affect tectonic plates? 2 what makes plates move? 3 what happens to the ocean floor during earthquakes? 4 in the future, will the moving plates makes a new ocean? 5 is it true that diamonds pop up when tectonic plates move around?

Here are my answers.

1 does gravity affect tectonic plates? Not that I know of. See the plates are constantly moving, and it has nothing to do with gravity. The plates will not float off the face of the earth if we didn’t have gravity. 2 what makes plates move? Convection (I’m a link. Click me!). Convection is a process that happens in the lower mantle, where the heated material will rise since it’s atoms and molecules are spread apart by the heat, whilst the cold material will sink because the cold particles will flock together, making it more dense. 3 what happens to the ocean floor during earthquakes? The sane as on land. But a different interesting thing happens. It’s called sea floor spreading (I’m a link. Click me!) sea floor spreading is a process that happens when there is a crack or fault in the sea floor that allows magma to come through. This magma will constantly creat layers or rock, which will push the old layers out. This creates so much rock that the stone layers are moving 200 km per 10 000 000 years. 4 in the future, will the moving plates makes a new ocean? Very possibly. In the distant future, the continents will make another super continent, which might make new oceans. 5 is it true that diamonds pop up when tectonic plates move around? I do not know.

Now we also have competences that we were accessed on. I’ll insert them below.

Competencies We need to demonstrate an understanding and appreciation of evidence. We need to demonstrate a sustained intellectual curiosity about a scientific topic or problem of personal interest. We need to explain that the theory of plate tectonics was a unifying theory that explains the earths geological processes We need to contribute to the care of self, others, the community and world through personal and collaborative approaches.
Competencies We need to demonstrate an understanding and appreciation of evidence. I have show this in my book, through evidence and theories proposed by Napoleon, one of the main characters, when he was explaining various geological processes to his dim brother, Terrance. We need to demonstrate a sustained intellectual curiosity about a scientific topic or problem of personal interest. I believe I have shown this through the project, but mostly with the MindMaps that I have made, where I was able to ask myself important questions and answer them at the end of the project. We need to explain that the theory of plate tectonics was a unifying theory that explains the earths geological processes. I have also shown this in my book, through Napoleon explaining the theory of plate tectonics and how it proved a unified theory for processes like sea floor spreading, deep sea ridges, etc. We need to contribute to the care of self, others, the community and world through personal and collaborative approaches. I have shown this through making a book that was respectful towards all groups, as well as good for any ages. I also showed this when we had to read our books to a fourth grader.