1. What is the Anthropocene? When did it start?

2. What is a solar system? How many planets are in our solar system?

3. What is a galaxy? What are galaxies composed of? What is the name of our galaxy?

4. What units are used to measure the size of a galaxy? How big is our galaxy?

5. What is the universe? What was the Big Bang and when did it happen?

6. Describe the sequence of events that formed our solar system.

7. How did the Moon form? When did it form?

8. How did the atmosphere and oceans form?

9. When did life first evolve? What kind of life was it?

10. What is the geologic time scale? What marks the beginning or end of a division of time?

11. How old is Earth?

12. Review some of the major events that have occurred in Earth’s history and when they occurred.

13. What is uniformitarianism? Use it to explain how a mountain range forms.

14. Compare and contrast relative ages with absolute ages. How is each determined?

15. Why is Earth’s interior hot?

16. What evidence is used to determine Earth’s internal structure?

17. List the layers of Earth’s interior, starting from the core and moving outward to the crust.

18. What generates Earth’s magnetic field? What does the magnetic field deflect?

19. What is the difference between the magnetic North Pole and the geographic North Pole?

20. What is the Moho?

21. What are the two kinds of crust, and where is each of them found?

22. Where on the planet is the crust thickest? Where is it thinnest?

23. Why is the lithosphere broken into plates?

24. Explain the connection between the loss of the Martian magnetic field and the loss of that planet’s early atmosphere and oceans.

25. Given what we know about Mars, how is Earth’s internal heat essential for life?

26. What role do volcanoes have in forming Earth’s atmosphere and oceans?

27. What role do volcanoes have in contributing to the greenhouse effect?

28. How are the oceans and the greenhouse effect important to life on Earth?