Rocks and minerals. The restless Earth / Горные породы и минералы. Беспокойная Земля

You are sitting on a rock right now. It is a big rock, so big that you, your classroom, your school, your town, and everything else—zebras, apple trees, polar bears, sneakers—can sit on top of it. We call it the Earth, but it is really just a big rock surrounded by empty space.
This rock is important. On it sits every plot of land that will grow your food, every drop of oil that will power your cars, every person you will ever know. On this one rock, you will spend every moment of your life.

But how much do you know about this rock? Where did Earth come from, and how did it form? Has it always been just like this? If you wanted to know how this rock, our home, came to be, what would you do? Where would you look for clues?

To begin, you might look down. Every small rock you see is a reflection of what Earth has gone through. Glassy black rocks mark moments when the Earth’s liquid insides spilled out onto its surface. Gritty, sandy rocks are the dead skin of the Earth, shed after years of wind and rain. Twisted, sparkly rocks formed deep in the bellies of mountains. <...>