WINTER BREAK PACKET: SUBMIT ANSWERS HERE!

Digestive System - Gross!
Click here to watch the video we viewed in class.
Here are the key points:
Mechanical digestion is the breakdown of food into smaller pieces by mashing, squeezing, chewing, etc.
Chemical digestion is the breakdown of food by chemical reactions
Mouth: mechanical digestion - chewing; chemical digestion - saliva is released by the salivary glands
Esophagus: no digestion, just a tube for the food to pass from your mouth to your stomach (takes about 5 seconds)
Stomach: mechanical digestion - churning and squeezing; chemical digestion: strong acid is released by the stomach wall;  the stomach's mucus lining protects the stomach from the acid
Small intestine: most of the nutrients from the food digested in the stomach are absorbed through the walls of the small intestine (absorption) and into the bloodstream where they travel to the cells of the body
Large intestine: water is removed from the undigested material (all the left-over stuff) and it becomes more solid
Liver: releases bile to help digestion
Pancreas: releases insulin to help digestion

Welcome to Unit 2: Dynamic Equilibrium: The Human Body

Here are some videos and interactive sites about the Human Body:

1. Discovery Channel Video Site
2. Build a Body Interactive 
3. What is a cell?
4. Human Body Organs Game

Answers to the Geology Exam Review worksheet

Layers near the surface of the Earth (lithosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, atmosphere)

What do the 4 prefixes mean? (litho-rock hydro-water bio-life atmos-air)
Rock cycle: how to read the rock cycle diagram

Describe two ways a sedimentary rock can form. an igneous rock weathers into sediment, erodes away, settles somewhere else, then is cemented and compacted into a sedimentary rock

Explain what turns an igneous rock into a metamorphic rock. heat and pressure

What are sediments? broken bits of rock that have been weathered
Formation of types of rocks (sedimentary, igneous, metamorphic)

Explain how each type of rock is formed. 

sedimentary: broken bits of rocks are pressed together and glued by minerals or other bits of rock

metamorphic: existing rocks are squeezed and heated, melting partially and morphing (changing) form
igneous: magma or lava cools, hardening into rock

What do sedimentary rocks contain that other types of rock do not? fossils
Properties of minerals: cleavage/fracture, luster, hardness, color, streak

Identify a mineral that has a green streak. pyrite

Identify a mineral that has cubic cleavage and tastes salty. halite

What properties would you need to observe to identify a mineral as calcite? bubbling with acid
Erosion – transportation of sediment after it is broken down by weathering

The forces that carry sediment (4 forces; 3 of them were demonstrated by sand in class) water, wind, glaciers, and gravity
Weathering (chemical and mechanical)

Explain how a pothole is formed.  A pothole is formed by ice wedging, which means that water seeps into a crack, then freezes and expands, wedging the rock apart.

Is the formation of a pothole mechanical or chemical weathering? physical

What is chemical weathering?  Chemical weathering is the breaking down of rocks where the composition of the rock is changed in the process.  This is different from physical weathering because physical weathering just makes rocks into smaller rocks.
Where fossils are found

In which type of rock are fossils mostly found?  Sedimentary
Relative ages of rocks

How does the age of fossils in the bottom layer of sedimentary rocks compare to the ages of fossils in the top layer?  The bottom layer is older than the top layer.
What the fossil record tells us

What can scientists infer by studying fossils of organisms that lived long ago? Scientists can infer what the characteristics of the climates and environments were.
Theory of Plate Tectonics

Alfred Wegener’s hypothesis:  The continents used to be connected and then have slowly moved apart to their current locations.

What fossils show about continental drift:  Fossils of some plants and animals can be found on more than one continent, showing that the continents used to be connected.
Convection Currents – movement that is created in a fluid when it is heated unevenly

Draw two convection currents in the mantle that are helping tectonic plates move.
Why one plate sinks under the other at a subduction zone

Draw a picture of one plate subducting under the other.

Label the plate that is more dense. The more dense plate is sinking under the continental plate.

Seafloor spreading

Who is Harry Hess?  What did he do to provide evidence for Wegener’s hypothesis?

Harry Hess used sonar to map the ocean floor.  He showed that there were ridges (mountains) and volcanoes on the seafloor, which provided evidence that new rock material was being created at the ridges, pushing the continents apart.
Measuring mass with a triple beam balance

Be able to measure mass to the nearest tenth of a gram.  

Geology UNIT TEST: WEDNESDAY 11/20

Make sure to study by interacting with the content, not just by reading it.  The topics are listed below.  The worksheets and notes you took in class will help you study for this test.

Layers near the surface of the Earth (lithosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere)
Rock cycle: how to read the rock cycle diagram
Formation of types of rocks (sedimentary, igneous, metamorphic_
Properties of minerals: cleavage/fracture, luster, hardness, color, streak
Erosion
Weathering (chemical and mechanical)
Where fossils are found
Relative ages of rocks (what the layers of sedimentary rocks show)
What the fossil record tells us
Theory of Plate Tectonics
Convection Currents
Why one plate sinks under the other at a subduction zone
Seafloor spreading
Measuring mass with a triple beam balance

This video will help you understand what happens when to plates collide and create a subduction zone. Click here to watch the video.

Types of Tectonic Plate boundaries:

Convergent - moving together (subduction is one of these)
Divergent - moving apart
Transform - sliding horizontally

Welcome to 7th Grade!

Thank you for visiting my site.

I will be posting helpful links to games and study sites shortly.  We are currently studying a unit on Geology and have just completed an activity on Topographic maps.

Topographic map.  Ask your 7th grader what this is!

CPCS Science Fair

A science fair project at CPCS must be an experimental project.  That means that you must be conducting an experiment to answer a question.

Use these websites to help you find a science project idea.  You must be able to find or buy all of the materials for your project, and you must be able to conduct multiple trials of the experiment within the time frame for the science fair.

Our science fair will be on Friday, May 31, 2013.  Your project presentation board will be due on Tuesday, May 28.

1. Education.com 
2. All Science Fair Projects

Use the link below for help and guidelines for creating a science fair board.

1. Guidelines for creating a science fair board

States of Matter: Overview

States of Matter: Another overview with great pictures

States of Matter: Animation

States of Matter: Interactive

Properties of Matter

VENOM - answer to a question asked in Dartmouth by a thoughtful student.