What are continental plates?
A continental plate is exemplified by the North American Plate, which includes North America as well as the oceanic crust between it and a portion of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.
What are the 3 types of continental plates?
Most seismic activity occurs at three types of plate boundaries—divergent, convergent, and transform. As the plates move past each other, they sometimes get caught and pressure builds up.
What are tectonic plates BBC Bitesize ks2?
The earth’s crust is broken into plates. It was once believed that convection currents in the mantle slowly moved the crust around. It is now thought that a mechanism called slab pull drives the movement of tectonic plates. Slab pull occurs where older, denser tectonic plates sink into the mantle at subduction zones.
What is the continental crust GCSE geography?
There are two different types of crust : continental crust, which carries land, and oceanic crust, which carries water. Continental plates are usually quite thick (between 35 to 100 km) compared to the much thinner oceanic plates (between 5 and 10 km).
What are continental plates made of?
Continental crust is composed of granitic rocks which are made up of relatively lightweight minerals such as quartz and feldspar. By contrast, oceanic crust is composed of basaltic rocks, which are much denser and heavier.
How are the continental plates formed?
Continental plates are formed due to cooling of magma. two plates collide with each other when one plate moves down another. The plate moving down gets heated tremendously due to the internal heat of the Earth and melts this way it gets destroyed.
How many continental plates are there?
The Earth is in a constant state of change. Earth’s crust, called the lithosphere, consists of 15 to 20 moving tectonic plates. The plates can be thought of like pieces of a cracked shell that rest on the hot, molten rock of Earth’s mantle and fit snugly against one another.
Are all the plates continental plates?
Tectonic Plates are of two types, namely oceanic crust and continental crust that differ in composition.
How do continents move Bitesize?
The plates move because of convection currents in the Earth’s mantle. These are driven by the heat produced by the natural decay of radioactive elements in the Earth. Where tectonic plates meet, the Earth’s crust becomes unstable as the plates push against each other, or ride under or over each other.
What is in the continental crust?
The continental crust is composed of granitic rocks, which have even more silicon and aluminum than the basaltic oceanic crust and are less dense than basalt.
What are characteristics of continental plates?
Continental crust is broadly granitic in composition and, with a density of about 2.7 grams per cubic cm, is somewhat lighter than oceanic crust, which is basaltic (i.e., richer in iron and magnesium than granite) in composition and has a density of about 2.9 to 3 grams per cubic cm.
