1. Landforms

2. Unit Standards
5.E.3A.1
Construct how different landforms and surface features result from the location and movement of water on Earth’s surface through watersheds (drainage basins) and rivers.
5.E.3A.2
Develop and use models to describe and compare characteristics and locations of the landforms on continents with those on the ocean floor (including the continental self and slope, the mid ocean ridge, the rift zone, the trench, and the abyssal plain).
5.E.3B.1
Analyze and interpret data to describe and predict how natural processes (such as weathering, erosion, deposition, earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes, or storms) affect Earth’s surface.

3. What are earthquakes?
The Earth’s surface is always changing. Most occur very slowly over long periods of time. Some changes can occur very quickly.

4. What are earthquakes?
The crust is the Earth’s outermost layer. Earth is made up of layers. The crust is the thinnest layer.

5. What are earthquakes?
Plates- gigantic slabs of rock that fit together like puzzle pieces and are always moving.

6. What are earthquakes?
Faults- breaks or cracks in Earth’s crust where the plates come together.

7. What are earthquakes?
Sometimes the plates push together or move under or over each other. At times, the plates move apart.

8. What are earthquakes?
Earthquakes- movements in the Earth’s crust that are caused by a sudden shift of Earth’s plates.

9. What are earthquakes?
Mountains and volcanoes form as plates move, too.

10. What causes an earthquake?
Most earthquakes happen where Earth’s plates meet. The plates are always moving.
Sometimes they move slowly, by only a few centimeters per year.
The slow movement along faults is called creep.
In places where faults are creeping, large earthquakes do no usually occur.

11. What causes an earthquake?
At other times, the motion is sudden. The energy is released by the sudden motion of plates shakes the crust. It can set a large earthquake in motion.

12. What causes an earthquake?
Three different types of faults
Normal fault- the plates pull apart. Rocks above the fault surface move down. The Sierra Nevada Mountains formed this way.

13. What causes an earthquake?
Three different types of faults
Reverse Fault- the plates push together. Rocks above the fault move upward. The Himalayas formed this way.

14. What causes an earthquake?
Three different types of faults
Strike-Slip Fault- plates slide past each other in different directions. The San Andreas Fault is an example of this.

15. What causes an earthquake?
During an earthquake the ground may vibrate, or shake. Sometimes the ground will split open.
The vibrations of an earthquake are strongest where the earthquake first begins—below the ground.

16. What causes an earthquake?
The vibrations move through the Earth’s crust in all directions. Vibrations move in ripples and weaken as it moves out.