Movers and Shakers Vocabulary ReviewCreated By Jacob Feinland

Convection Current

• The theoretical cycle, where hot, light liquid in the mantle beneath the Earth’s crust, rises, cools, and sinks, causing Earth’s plates to move.

Plate Tectonics

• The theory that Earth’s lithosphere is broken into sections called plates.

Pangaea

• The single landmass existing about 200,000,000 years ago that was compiled of all of the continents

Inner Core

• The central, most dense part of the Earth made mostly of iron.

Outer Core

• The larger and less dense layer towards the center of the Earth that surrounds the inner core.

Mantle

• The large plastic-like layer of molten rock below the crus.t

Lithosphere

• The crust and part of the upper mantle, which together make up Earth’s plates.

Seafloor Spreading

• The theory that hot, light material in the mantle rises, breaks through the seafloor, pushes the crust apart, and cools to become the new ocean floor.

Continental Drift

• The theory that continents have slowly moved to their current locations.

Convergent Boundary

• When two plates are pushed against each other.

Divergent Boundary

• When two plates separate, and a gap is left in between.

Transform Boundary

• When two plates slide past each other.

Fault

• The surfaces rocks move along when they break.

Earthquake

• Vibrations created by the breaking of rock.

Seismic Wave

• A wave of energy caused by an earthquake.

Primary Wave

• The seismic wave in which the energy moves in the same direction as the wave.

Secondary Wave

• The seismic wave in which the energy moves side to side at angles perpendicular to the wave.

Surface Wave

• The seismic wave in which the energy travels up and down in the wave.

Epicenter

• The part of the surface of the Earth that is directly above the focus

Magnitude

• A measure of the amount of energy released in an earthquake

Hot Spot

• An area in the mantle that is unusually hot. Rock melts there and is pushed through the crust, forming a volcano.

Subduction Zone

• An area at a convergent boundary, where an oceanic is pushed underneath a continental plate.

Magma

• Hot melted rock below the Earth’s crust.

Eruption

• When material suddenly bursts from its container after a build up of pressure.

Shield Volcano

• The gently sloped volcano that forms when basaltic lava erupts quietly and spreads out in flat layers.

Cinder Cone Volcano

• The steep sloped volcano that forms when explosive eruptions of lava turns into tephra and fall.

Composite Volcano

• A volcano formed when a cycle of alternating explosive and quiet eruptions take place, forming alternating tephra and lava layers.

Ring of Fire

• A circle of many active volcanoes surrounding the Pacific Ocean.

Trench

• The area on the Earth’s surface between the two colliding plates at a Subduction zone.