Are you READY to teach plate tectonics? Are you excited? You should be. And you CAN be. Get ready to ENJOY teaching again!
I’ve been teaching Plate Tectonics for… ever. Over the past decade or so, I’ve spent days… DAAAAYS, developing the absolute BEST activities for this unit. Here we go!
I start with notes. Yup, sounds boring, I know. I actually go back to these A. LOT. After I talk about Alfred Wegener and his theory of plate tectonics… I explain how he supported his theory and why it wasn’t accepted initially. I ask the students to explain these points EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. afterword. It holds them accountable for keeping that tab on “where we started” at the beginning of the unit. The PPT and note sheets are editable. Great for those A-type learners.
Enough about the boring part, here are all the ACTIVITIES!
The theory of plate tectonics and continental drift would not be complete without that oh-so-popular Pangea Puzzle. Reconstruct the supercontinent of Pangea using fossil and geologic evidence.
Read, highlight, take some notes on the layers of the Earth. Not sure why, but my kiddos LOVE mastering these facts!
For FULL understanding of convection currents in the mantle, I like to take a day and read about methods of heat transfer. We will in Frayer Model Cards. It’s fun.
My students love this activity for the sole reason that they get to walk around the room to find information. The graphic organizer is insanely helpful for review.
My students LOOOOVE these sorting cards. Use the graphic organizer from the last activity the first one or two days you do these (there are 24 cards, you have to put them by fours into the 6 types of plate boundaries). The four cards for each boundary type include one card with boundary type name, one cards with map, one with example, one with clipart. They’re amazing. Students love the review without having to write anything.
Tectonic Plate MAPS are the BEST way to pull everything together!! There are three map assignments in this resource. Each has a different difficulty level and focus. They’re AWESOMESAUCE.
Again, kids are up out of their seats… AND with minimal writing! 24 task cards- directly from content and images used prior- all multiple choice.
But WAIT! There’s MORE! This bundle comes with a WORKBOOK!! ALL student pages, strung together with checkpoints between lessons, a copy of task cards for students, AND an editable test!! That’s literally everything you need to enjoy teaching plate tectonics. (Google workbook included as well as two additional digital activities.)
Get your life back. Enjoy teaching again.
You can find all of this gloriousness HERE.