Tools for mineral identification include hand lenses (lower left), a penny for testing hardness (center), a streak plate (lower right), and an identification guidebook (top).
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Windows to the Universe
Books to Help You Identify Minerals and Rocks!
Are you going out to search for rocks and minerals?
How will you know what types you have found?
Identification guidebooks for rocks and minerals can be very helpful.
Pick one that has nice color pictures and language you can understand. Look for the titles below at a bookstore or library near you!
There are rock and mineral identification books for kids such as:
- Peterson First Guide to Rocks and Minerals by Frederick
Pough
- Rocks and minerals of the world by Michael O'Donoghue and
others
- Crystal and Gem, Eyewitness Books, by R.F. Symes and R.R. Harding
There are also great picture book stories about rocks and minerals!
- Let’s Go Rock Collecting, By Roma Gans
- The Magic School Bus Inside the Earth, by Joanna Cole
- How Mountains Are Made, by Kathleen Weidner Zoehfeld
Shop Windows to the Universe Science Store!
The
Fall 2010 issue of The Earth Scientist, focuses on rocks and minerals, including articles on minerals and mining, the use of minerals in society, and rare earth minerals, and includes 3 posters!
You might also be interested in:
Stick these things into a small bag and take them wherever you go hunting for minerals. A hand lens lets you look closely at small mineral crystals or fossils. A small, white porcelain plate is used for
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Spotting minerals is fun! There are many different types of minerals. Each has a different name and special traits. You can learn more about minerals by looking closely at them to understand their special
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This mineral is called quartz! Sometimes it looks white like milk but usually it looks clear like glass, sometimes with a little pink or gray tinge of color. You can find crystals of quartz in many different
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Mica minerals make some rocks sparkle! Look for them in your igneous and metamorphic rocks. Do they make your rocks sparkle? They break into flat plates because they have cleavage.
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This is a feldspar mineral! Look for it in igneous rocks where it looks like white or pink crystals. You might find it in other types of rocks as well.
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The mineral that is green is called olivine! Look for it in igneous and metamorphic rocks. In this picture, olivine is filling a hole in the igneous rock.
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There are at least 2000 minerals on Earth. That's a lot of minerals! But you don't need to know all of them to spot the minerals lurking in the rocks of your backyard. That is because only a small number
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