1. Continental Drift

2. Evidence of Continental Drift
Ever since Maps of the Atlantic Ocean were first published, scholars have pondered the remarkable jigsaw fit between the ocean’s opposing coastline

4. Continental Drift
This jigsaw fit led Alfred Wegener, a German meteorologist, in 1915 to propose a hypothesis of continental drift
The concept that the continents have been, and are, presently shifting their position on the Earth’s surface

5. Pangea Approximately 200 million years ago, Pangea began to break up
This started to form today’s present continent and oceanic location
Alfred Wegener believed the continents drifted together over 300 million years ago to form a super continent called Pangea
Pangea means all land!!!

6. Evidence of Pangea and Continental Drift
1. Continents seem to fit together
Today the fit is done at the continental shelf and is nearly a perfect match

7. Similarity of rocks and minerals

8. Mountain formations . .

9. 4. Fossil records

10. The plates must have moved through certain climates in previous times
Climate records
Glacial Deposits at the Equator
Coral Reefs in Antarctica
How could this have occurred?
The plates must have moved through certain climates in previous times

12. The Scientific Community Never Accepted Alfred Wegener’s Ideas About Continental Drift!!
WHY?
Alfred Wegener could never prove how or why the continents actually moved

13. Alfred Weneger and Continental Drift
Song:

18. DO NOW
What are the five pieces of evidence that Wegener presented to support his hypothesis?
Jigsaw puzzle fit
Matching age of rock
Matching fossils
Climate records
Matching mountain ranges