Format of exam: 28 multiple choice questions, 17 fill-in-the-blank.  I would strongly recommend looking over your old exams.

The test is heavy on rocks: recommend you know what the following are:  arkose, graywacke, quartz sandstone, marble, quartzite, hornfels, blueschist, granulite, granite, diorite, gabbro, serpentinite, peridotite, tuff, obsidian, scoria, pumice, basalt, andesite, rhyolite, breccia, conglomerate, shale, gneiss, migmatite, mylonite, limestone, chert, schist, slate, coal.

You should know which of the following minerals has which of the following distinctive characteristics:  Minerals (calcite, limonite, hematite, quartz, plagioclase feldspar); characteristics (fizzes in acid, yellow-brown streak, red-brown streak, hardness of 7 which easily scratches glass, striations on cleavage surfaces).

Terms to know:  aphanitic, phaneritic, felsic, intermediate, mafic, ultramafic, lopolith, laccolith, stock, sill, dike, batholith, neck, fractional crystallization, partial melting, assimilation, ophiolite, chondrite, aulocogen, oblique fault, subduction, sea floor spreading, transform boundary, divergent boundary, convergent boundary.

You should know the crystallization sequence described by Bowen (Bowen's reaction series).  Which minerals crystallize first; which crystallize last

You should understand how melting occurs:  pressure relief melting (at mid-ocean ridges and hot spots) always produces basaltic magma; melting via addition of water lowers the solidus temperature (at subduction zones) and generally produces intermediate composition melts.  Heat transfer can only melt rocks that are more silica rich than the magma from which the heat is being transferred and results in bimodal volcanism at continental hot spots.

You should know the different volcano types, what they look like, and what they are made of:  shield volcanoes (basalt); stratovolcanoes/composite volcanoes (mainly intermediate composition lavas and ash--so andesitic); cinder cones (scoria), domes (mainly intermediate and felsic lava-so andesite and rhyolite). You should also know where each type is likely to be located

You should be able to come up with the name for any of the igneous rocks in the chart below.  Understand the difference between crystalline rocks (classified on the basis of texture and chemistry) and noncrystalline (vesicular, fragmental, glassy) rocks. Look at the chart - for each composition you should know what minerals you expect to find in the crystalline igneous rocks

Classification of igneous rocks
 

Crystalline-means	made from many	individual mineral	grains that grew in	a melt
Composition >>>  Texture (below)	Felsic	Intermediate	Mafic	Ultramafic
aphanitic (fine-grained)	rhyolite	andesite	basalt	komatiite
phaneritic  (coarse-grained)	granite	diorite	gabbro	peridotite
pegmatitic (super  coarse-grained)	granite pegmatite	diorite pegmatite	gabbro pegmatite
Minerals you'd	expect to find in	this composition	crystalline rock	.
	quartz, potassium   feldspar,   plagioclase   feldspar	amphibole,    plagioclase    feldspar	pyroxene,    plagioclase    feldspar	pyroxene,    olivine
Other rocks - such	as those made from	glass or fragments	of rocks or ash	.
glassy	obsidian	obsidian	obsidian
"frothy" (more  holes than rock) also called vesicular	pumice	pumice	scoria
large fragments  (>2mm) (rocks)	breccia	breccia	breccia
small fragments  (<=2mm) (ash)	tuff	tuff	tuff

 

Sedimentary Rocks:

Classification for clastic/detrital sedimentary rocks (classified on the basis of grain size)

Grain size	Name of Rock
Gravel (includes boulders, cobbles, pebbles, granules	if grains are angular:  breccia  if grains are rounded:  conglomerate
Sand - will feel gritty when rubbed between fingers	sandstone  - if contains more than 90% quartz:  quartz sandstone  - if contains more than 25% feldspar:  arkose  - if poorly sorted with a lot of mud:  graaywacke
Mud - will feel smooth or powerdery when rubbed between            fingers   - includes silt (feels gritty against teeth)   - includes clay (feels smooth against teeth)	if breaks along flat surfaces (fissile): shale

Classification of chemical sedimentary rocks (classified on the basis of mineralogy)

made from silica (SiO2)	made from calcite (CaCO3)  all will react with HCl	made from other minerals
chert - microcrystalline quartz (hard and tends to show conchoidal fracture) diatomite - made from diatom shells (easily confused with chalk)	limestone - generic name oolitic limestone - spherical grains like tiny beads chalk - made from shells of tiny plankton coquina - made from visible shells or shell fragments travertine - forms in caves and often has a banded appearance	dolostone - made from dolomite rock salt - made from halite rock gypsum - made from gypsum

Metamorphic Rocks:

Terms to know:  Regional metamorphism, contact metamorphism, index minerals, foliation

Rock classification is messy:

Texture: Foliated rock sequence from metamorphism of shale:  slate, phylllite, schist, gneiss, migmatite

Special processes:  hydrothermal alteration of peridotite: serpentinite                               contact metamorphism: hornfels                               alteration along a fault:  mylonite

Composition: made from quartz: quartzite                      made from limestone:  marble

Facies: blueschist - high pressure low temperature in trench at subduction zone            other facies (eclogite, amphibolite, granulite, greenschist)

Earthquakes, folds and faults, plate tectonics, and earth's interior

Terms to know:  epicenter (and how you locate using three or more earthquake records), focus, P-waves, S-waves, Rayleigh waves, Love waves, normal fault, reverse fault, thrust fault, hanging wall, footwall,

Chemical layers of the Earth: crust, mantle, core
Mechanical layers of the Earth, lithosphere, asthenosphere (low-velocity zone), lower mantle (transition zone and rest of lower mantle), core-mantle boundary, outer core, inner core.  The Earth's magnetic field is generated in the Earth's outer core.