Properties of Minerals
8th grade
Standard III, objective 1
Description: Students will identify properties that are useful and not useful to identify minerals and make predictions about how those properties might be useful.
Materials needed:
▪Minerals from identification sets
▪scale
▪Ruler
▪Hand lens
▪Streak Plate
▪Glass Plate
Prior knowledge needed: nothing
Time required: 1 period
Special teacher procedures, safety notes, and suggestions:
●Minerals are a special category of matter. They are naturally made of specific atoms and molecules. The atoms that they are made of and the way the atoms are arranged give properties to the minerals.
●Minerals, in turn, are the building blocks of rocks. Some minerals and rocks are used for different purposes, based on their properties.
●You might brainstorm with the students some of the properties they might use in their data table. Be sure to leave some columns blank so they can find their own properties to use as headings.
●Students can use other tools, like finger nails for hardness in the properties, but do not use official tests like field hardness yet.
Student sheet or handout (if needed): Use the following sheet.
Scoring guide: Check for completeness and answers that show reasonable and logical thought.
Name: ______Per. ____ Date: _____ Integrated Science 8 Honors
Properties of Minerals
Purpose: What are some properties of minerals? How can you use those properties to make something useful out of the minerals?
Materials:
●Mineral kits●Hand lenses
●Streak Plate / ●Rulers
●Scale
●Glass Plate
●Graduated cylinder
Prediction: What are three ways that you could tell the difference between the minerals in your collection?
______
Procedure:
- With the class and your group, use the prediction to brainstorm a list of properties that you can observe or measure for the minerals in your collection. Properties should be those that would be true for all minerals of the same kind, not just that one piece.
- Choose three characteristics you will measure to identify your minerals, and enter them in your table.
- Fill out the data table with the information for each mineral.
- For as many as you can, make a prediction about what that mineral could be used for and what property made it possible. (For instance, if you had a diamond in the collection, you might find that it was really hard. The property of hardness would mean you could use it to cut through things easily.)
Data:
Mineral# / What might this mineral be used for? / Which property allows this?
Analysis:
What were some properties that you could not observe or measure because you did not have the right tools?
Conclusion: What are two things you learned about identifying minerals?