• Quick retrieval from earlier learning (The structure of the Earth). Students answer on mini whiteboards.
• Show answers together and note who needs support in the main task.

1. How do scientists know about the inside of the Earth? (By studying how earthquake waves travel through it / By looking at the Moon / By visiting the core / By drilling to the centre) → By studying how earthquake waves travel through itPrompt: The deepest hole ever drilled is only about 12 km deep.
2. Earth's structure: which statement is NOT true? (The inner core is solid. / The crust is made of rock. / The Earth is hollow. / The mantle is the thickest layer.) → The Earth is hollow.Prompt: Is the mantle really a sea of liquid?
3. Which is the thinnest layer of the Earth? (the crust / the mantle / the outer core / the inner core) → the crustPrompt: It is like the skin on an apple.

• Pass round different rocks and ask how each one might have formed.
• Share the objective: Plate tectonics, earthquakes and volcanoes. Read the success criteria together.

• Work through the example out loud, saying why you do each step, not just what you do.
• Example: Who first proposed that the continents drift?
• Step 1: Wegener's continental drift (1912) was later explained by plate tectonics.
• Step 2: So the answer is: Alfred Wegener
• Answer: Alfred Wegener
• Pause after each step and ask a student to say what comes next.

• Do these together. Students try each step on whiteboards before you reveal it.
• Use the hints as prompts rather than giving the answer.

1. Who first proposed that the continents drift? (Charles Darwin / Galileo Galilei / Isaac Newton / Alfred Wegener) → Alfred WegenerPrompt: He noticed that South America and Africa fit together like a jigsaw.
2. Two plates move apart at about 2 cm per year. How far apart will they move in 100 000 years, in kilometres? (1 km = 100 000 cm) → 2 kmPrompt: First find the distance in cm.

• Students work on the student sheet. Circulate and check the first two answers of every student early.
• Students who finish: write a question of their own for a partner, with the answer.

The 6 questions are on the student sheet below, with answers in the key.

• Two questions on their own. Sort answers into got it / nearly / not yet to plan the next lesson.

1. Where do most earthquakes and volcanoes happen? (only at the North Pole / in the middle of every continent / along the edges of tectonic plates / randomly everywhere) → along the edges of tectonic platesPrompt: Plates push, pull and slide against each other.
2. Plate tectonics: which statement is NOT true? (Scientists cannot yet predict exactly when an earthquake will happen. / Mountains such as the Himalayas formed where plates collided. / Volcanoes only form in hot countries. / The Earth's crust is broken into large pieces called tectonic plates.) → Volcanoes only form in hot countries.Prompt: How fast do your fingernails grow? Plates move at about that speed.

Free online practice with hints and printable worksheets for this skill: eurekami.com/science/grade-7.