Rock Cycle: Change a Rock’s Story
Understand the three rock types and the processes that convert them, and see that the rock cycle offers many valid routes rather than one fixed loop.
Before you try
What if a grain of sand on a beach was once part of a mountain, and before that molten lava?
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What happened?
Move a control to see what changes and why.
Each change happens the moment you apply it. Real rock cycles take thousands to millions of years.
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Try these ideas
- Turn sediment into marble and count how many steps it takes.
- Try compacting igneous rock and read why it does not work.
- Send a rock right round back to its starting type.
Why it works
Rocks fall into three families. Igneous rock forms when molten magma cools and hardens, giving granite deep underground or basalt at the surface. Sedimentary rock forms when loose sediment is buried, squeezed and cemented together, giving sandstone and limestone. Metamorphic rock forms when existing rock is baked and squashed without melting, turning limestone into marble and mud rock into slate.
The processes link them all. Weathering and erosion break any solid rock into sediment. Compaction and cementation press sediment into sedimentary rock. Heat and pressure make metamorphic rock. Melting sends anything back to magma. There is no single loop: a rock can take many routes and go round more than once, over millions of years. In this simulator you apply a process, watch the marker travel and build up a story.
Check your understanding
Question 1 of 4
What must happen to magma for igneous rock to form?
Limestone is buried and baked by heat and pressure. What does it become?
Is there only one path around the rock cycle?
Which process turns solid rock into loose sediment?
Explain it in your own words
What changed? Why did it happen? Where might you notice this in everyday life?
For parents & teachers
- Collect a few pebbles and try to sort them into the three families.
- Ask why marble is used for monuments and sandstone for building blocks.
- Discuss how long a full trip round the rock cycle might take.