Minerals and Rocks

Syllabus tag: KCSE | Geography | Form 1 | Topic 6 Minerals and Rocks

Lesson objectives

By the end of this topic, you should be able to:

• Define a mineral and a rock and state the characteristics of minerals.
• Describe the three classes of rock and how each is formed.
• Name the sub-types of igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic rocks.
• Describe the distribution of major rocks in Kenya and state their significance.

Summary

A mineral is a naturally occurring substance of definite chemical composition; a rock is an aggregate of one or more minerals. Rocks are classified by how they formed: igneous from cooled magma, sedimentary from deposited material in layers, and metamorphic from existing rocks changed by heat and pressure.