Texas TEKS 7.10.A
The Standard
describe the evidence that supports that Earth has changed over time, including fossil evidence, plate tectonics, and superposition
Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for Science
Teacher's field guide
What This Standard Means
What Students Need to Do
- Students use fossils, rock-layer order, and plate movement to explain how Earth’s surface has changed. They connect each type of evidence to a specific conclusion about past conditions or events.
What Mastery Looks Like
- Students can interpret a rock-layer diagram, compare fossil locations, and identify signs of plate movement. They support a claim about Earth’s past with relevant evidence and clear reasoning.
Common Misconceptions
- Students may assume every lower rock layer is older, even when layers have been folded, faulted, or overturned. They may treat fossils as exact dates or think continents move across a fixed crust instead of moving with tectonic plates.
How to Assess It
- Give students a diagram with layered rocks, fossils, and a fault. Ask them to identify one older layer and explain two clues showing that the area changed over time.
Lesson moves
Ways to Teach It
Build cups with sand, gravel, and shell fossils, then tilt and fault the layers to compare original and disturbed layer order.
Write a claim explaining how matching fossils on separated continents support past plate movement, using two pieces of evidence.
Sort rock-layer, fossil, and plate-boundary cards by evidence type, then challenge a partner to justify each placement.
Compare a current USGS earthquake map with a plate-boundary map and explain why clusters reveal ongoing changes to Earth’s surface.
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Printable 7.10.A Worksheet
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Related Standards
- 3.10.C
model and describe rapid changes in Earth's surface such as volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, and landslides.
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Earth and space. The student knows that there are recognizable processes that change Earth over time. The student is expected to:
- 8.11.A
use scientific evidence to describe how natural events, including volcanic eruptions, meteor impacts, abrupt changes in ocean currents, and the release and abso...
- 4.10.B
model and describe slow changes to Earth's surface caused by weathering, erosion, and deposition from water, wind, and ice; and
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