Earth's Inner Layers

Lab Brief #2

🎯 Your mission

Master the concept. Use it tomorrow.

⚡ The twist

Today's mountain was yesterday's ocean floor.

What you'll learn

Earth has three main layers: the thin outer crust, the thick mantle, and the dense core. The core has a liquid outer layer and a solid inner layer made mostly of iron.

Key words

tectonic plates
The giant slabs of rock that make up Earth's surface.
mineral
A natural solid found in the ground that makes up rocks.

Make a hypothesis first

Guess: where will the water go first?

Say your guess out loud — then find out if you were right.

Step 1 of 4 · Read

Look at the vocabulary words and write a definition for each in your own words.

Step 2 of 4 · Do

Create a timeline of Earth's history on a 5-meter strip of paper. Place major events (first life, dinosaurs, ice ages, humans) at the correct scale.

Step 3 of 4 · Observe

Note any unexpected results and think about why they happened.

Step 4 of 4 · Record

Share your findings with the class or a partner and discuss what you learned.

Question 1 of 3

Which layer of Earth is the thinnest?

How sure are you?😐 maybe

Question 2 of 3

What is the atmosphere?

How sure are you?😐 maybe

Question 3 of 3

What are tectonic plates?

How sure are you?😐 maybe

Mind = blown

🌋 There are 1,500 active volcanoes on Earth right now.

Nice work!

You got 0 of 3 right.

Next: Moving Tectonic Plates All lessons

🎯

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✨ More to explore

🌍 Where you see this in real life: Today's weather, tomorrow's beach, next century's coastline — all this.

🏆 Stretch challenge (try it this week): Look at the sky for 5 minutes and try to predict tomorrow's weather.

👨‍👩‍👧 For the dinner table: “What's the slowest change you can think of?”

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Earth's Inner Layers

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