Name: ______

Earths’ Surface was formed from a variety of geologic processes

Process/Landform / Definition / Picture / What could affect its formation
Constructive Force / processes that build up Earth's crust, create new landforms, or add sediment to existing areas of land
Destructive Force / processes that break down rocks and landforms and carry sediment away
Mechanical Weathering / Breakdown of rock into smaller pieces by PHYSICAL means
Ex: Ice, wind, water, gravity, plants, animals
Chemical Weathering / The process by which rocks break down as a result of CHEMICAL reactions
Ex: Water, Acid Precipitation, groundwater acid, acid in living things, air
Erosion / The process by which soil and sediment is transported from one location to another
Deposition / The process by which sediments are released (dropped)
Agents responsible for Weathering, Erosion, and Deposition / Running Water (Streams and Rivers)
Moving Ice (Glaciers)
Ocean Waves
Wind
Mass Wasting (Huge amounts of rock/sediment moving downhill)
Streams and Rivers / Erosion starts upstream and deposition happens downstream
Sediment is smooth because of weathering (water rolling over the sediment)
Young rivers have faster erosion
Mature Rivers have more deposition
Deposition happens mostly at mouth of ocean/lake and inside bends of rivers/streams
Faster Erosion
More Deposition
Floodplains / A nearly flat expanse of land that stretches from the banks of a slow, meandering river
Glacial Erosion / Glacier - a large body of snow and ice that forms on land and does not melt annually
Creates U shaped valleys
Smooth bedrock beneath and on sides of valley
Rocks trapped in glacier cut lines into bedrock
Moraines – / deposit of sediment that forms at the edge of a glacier as it pauses
Till - / Sediment directly deposited by glacial ice as it melts
Drumlins - / Hills molded from till by glaciers moving over it
Outwash Plains - / Broad, flat area in front of a glacier where large amounts of sediment
are deposited by
glacial melt water
Kettles – / Large depression left when ice melts
Kettle lakes form when water wills the depression
Erratic - / a rock or boulder that differs from the surrounding rock and is believed to have been brought from a distance by glacial action
Eskers - / A long, narrow, winding ridge composed of sand and gravel deposited by a glacier
Cliffs - / A vertical, or near vertical, rock exposure
Sea Stacks - / landform consisting of a steep and often vertical column or columns of rock in the sea near a coast
Beach - / Sand is deposited by waves
Spits - / Adepositional landformfound offcoasts where at one end, spits connect to land, and
extend into the water
Barrier Islands - / a coastal landform and a type of barrier system, are exceptionally flat and lumpy areas of sand, that are parallel to the mainland coast
Wind / Weathering, erosion, and deposition by wind is common in:
Arid reqions with no veggitation so sediment is exposed.
Along costal regions where wind is active
Deserts where sandblasting occurs
Yardangs - / A hill carved frombedrockby the dual action of wind abrasion, from dust and sand
Dunes - / Hills formed by deposition of sand
Along coasts and in deserts
Mass Wasting - / Materials such as rock and sediment move downhill because of gravity
Threat to humans and their property
Mass wasting can be:
Dry or wet
Slow or fast
Large chunks or small particles
Avalanche - / a rapid flow of snow down a sloping surface
Soil Creep - / the slow downward progression ofrockandsoildown a lowgrade slope
Mudslides - / a rapid movement of a large mass ofmudformed from loosedirtand water
Rockfall - / quantities ofrockfalling freely from acliff
Landslides - / the sudden movement of large amounts of loose soil, rocks, and other materials as they fall or slide downward due to gravity