Minerals are the building blocks of rocks, and rocks are the building blocks of the Earth's crust. This course will go into more detail with sediments and sedimentary rocks in later labs because it is the sedimentary rocks which record the history of life on Earth. Each mineral has different physical and chemical properties which allow it to be identified. Physical properties you will use to identify the minerals include color, hardness, luster, cleavage, magnetism, reaction to acid, etc. Rocks An aggregate of one or more minerals.
Rocks are the building blocks of the Earth's crust.
The Earth's continental crust is dominated by granite, and the oceanic crust is dominated by basalt. Both of these are igneous rocks. Luster - The character of the light reflected from the mineral. Hardness - The resistanceof a mineral to scratching. Hardness is measured on a scale of 1-10 called Mohs Hardness Scale .