Thursday, November 18, 2010

Identifying Minerals

In the past few days in science, your view of minerals has likely changed. You've discovered that there are many different classes/types of minerals -- each with a unique set of properties that allows us to identify one mineral from another.
In your comment, completely answer the following questions. If you don't want your comment to be published, that is fine! Just let me know in the comment you leave.

  1. Minerals are identified by their properties. What are some of the properties you used to distinguish one mineral from another? Why is it best to use more than just one or two of these properties?
  2. Did some of the properties "work" better than others? Which ones were the most effective? Which were the least effective? Explain.
  3. What was the most difficult part of identifying minerals?

55 comments:

Katie T. said...

1. streak, luster, density, hardness, acid test; so it is more reliable.
2. yes, most: streak luster density hardness and acid test; least: color and luster; because color and luster can change over time.
3. when two minerals are a lot alike.

Mercedes D. said...

Luster, Color, Streak, Hardness. Some minerals are the same and some ways and different in others. Yes, color and hardness. I didnt like using streak. it was hard to tell what shade or color it was. Nothing was difficult except some minerals were very similar.

Bryanb said...

1. streak, color, luster, you should use two to make sure
2. the most effective ones were density, and streak and hardness
3.guessing which ones were which

jasmine and olivia t said...

1. luster, color, streak, density and hardness
2. yes because the color can change from heat and other stuff and density is the best
3. trying to figure out what one it is

Nevada Pd. 3 said...

1. you can use density for a property you figure out one mineral from another because not many minerals have the same density also hardness and streak because all minerals have diff. hardness and streak.You use more thann jusst one of these because you can than do ilmination by which one has all the properties of whatever mineral. I would have to say the hardest part about idtentifying minerals would have to be luster and color because color can be effect easily by air and water.

Kevin M said...

luster, cleavage or fracture, color, and streak
yes, streak was probably the most reliable, and color was the least because color can change with ipurities, change in air, or water
The most difficult part is when two of the minerals look alike or when their streak was none or see through

connor h said...

1. luster, streak, and color because they can have the same streak and color for a mineral so you should use more than just one id thing.
2.Yes streak was the best because not a lot of minerals had the same streak least was color a lot of minerals had the same color.
3.trying to find the minerals on the dichotimus key and getting them right.

MartinL said...

1. whether it reflects light or what kind of streak it has.

Color, Luster, Density,Celeveage, Etc.

2. I would say the way it reflected the light, & what kind of streak it left behind.

3.Trying to figure out the color because some of them had different shapes but the same color & one would react with acid but the other wouldn't

anne r said...

1. hardness, streak, luster, density. you use it to narrow down so you can find the exact mineral.
2.streak, color, and hardness because each mineral has their own unique thing.
3.luster

Mike Ehrman said...

1. Density, streak, luster, hardness, fracture/cleavage, color. It's good to use multiple ones because some might have the same.
2. Density and hardness. Because there was a variety of densities but when they were the same, hardness could tell them apart. Color and acid test because they often were similar and not many reacted to acid.
3. Identifying all the properties, because a lot were similar.

Corey Brewers said...

1. some of the properties to identify minerals are streak, hardness, luser and color and density. the best ones to identify an object is density.

2.Density is the most easiest to identify a mineral and color and streak are the most hardies becasue you can get the colors wrong.

3.Trying to get the color write becasue sometime you would not know what color it really truly was.

noah t and hayley h said...

1. I had to figure out the density and hardness of the mineral because you could know for sure that it is the right mineral.

2. color and stread were the least effective bacause they can be changed easily. Density and hardness were the best because it was not something that was in common for a lot of minerals.

3. the most difficult part was identifiying the properties.

Noah and Hayley because hers wasnt working.

alex McDermott said...

1.i used how it felt how it looked how heavy. Because some may have the same things.
2.the acid one it worked good becase some of them wernt ractive to acid.
3.alot had the samethings

Jordan D. said...

1:I use streak, density, harness, acidic reaction, and shape. all are helpful because even if two minerals look the same, they may not have the same density, streak, or hardness.
2: the three that worked the best were harness, streak, and density. the density helped with elements that are hard to tell apart, such as pirite and gold. the hardness worked for distingushing dimonds and crystals. the streak identified how the color shows up on white. the acidic acid did not help much due to that fact that very few minerals reacted to it.
3: making sure that all the material fits.

Imrann&Kolby said...

1. Luster, Hardness, Clevage,fracture, and streak.

2 The most effective one was the Hardness, Luster, and Streak. Least Effective- Clevage,and fracture

3. Some of them had very close properties to each other.

Anna Mahomie && Kristie McGeek(: said...

1) In identifying minerals, you can use the luster, streak, hardness, density, and cleavage/fracture. You can also use color, but that is not always the best way to tell one mineral from another. :) It is WAYY more reliable to use more than just one.
2)Most effective=hardness and streak. Least effective=color :D
3) The most difficult part in identifying minerals is that some have the same properties as others,l then you just have to eliminate by guessing!

Sam Denevan said...

It is smart to put the element through more that one test because some minerals may have 2 or 3 properties that are the same like color or hardness so you should put it through a series of test. Some properties worked better that others, for example streak works better than color because many minerals have the same color but not many have the same streak. I would say that the most difficult part of identifying minerals is finding the density, it isnt really that hard it is just time consuming.

Murad/ Tyler Hofer said...

minerals properties are identifyed by density, color, streak, luster, plus hardness. because alot of minerals have different properties like streak, density, and hardness. yes alot of properties work but the most one that help us out was streak, luster, and density. personily we both think color was the least helpfull because the rock color could of change though water or air.identifying the minerals by color because they could of been infeated by water or air.

Ashley Z and Casey L said...

#1Color, Density, Streak, Acid Reaction, Luster, Hardness, Cleavage/Fracture. If the mineral has all the same properties as the identification chart, then it is that mineral. So, if a mineral's color was blue and it matched but the densities were entirely different, then it wouldn't be that mineral.
#2Streak, Density and Hardness were the most effective and work better. Color can change if the lighting is different or had a reaction to something. Cleavage and Fratcure were sometimes hard to tell which one was which.
#3There were many minerals with the same properties :)

shelby loseth said...

1.)Color,luster,streak,acid reaction,hardness. So you can be sure it is correct.
2.)Yes. Acid reaction,luster,hardness. Color and streak because many have the same color and most have no streak.
3.)Figuring out exactly what they were.
Shelby Loseth and Brooke Weber

Adam K Derick N said...

1.color,streak,luster,and hardness.
to get a accurate guess on what kind of mineral it is.



2.yes, Streak,luster, and hardness were very effective and color was not because its color can be changed




3.trying to find matches fot the answers you had, and also trying to find it's luster, and hardness

Riley Theobld and tyler kjelsen said...

color streak hardness cleavage reaction to acid luster it is important to use more than one of these indacators because they ate not always accuerate .

zb tk said...

#1 streak, color, luster, acid test are good ways to identify minerals. using more then one property is good because some minerals could have the same color luster or even be reactive to acid
#2 hardness, streak,and luster
#3 knowing what color the mineral was

Lukas N said...

Some properties used to identify minerals are color, streak, special properties, luster,hardness, and fracture. the most relable is streak, hardness, and special properties. color was effective because of some inpurities. The hardess part was getting it down to one mineral

Emily E. & Krista P. said...

1. some properties of minerals are color, density, luster, magnetism, hardness, streak, cleavage an so on.
2. denstiy, hardness and streak are more effective. color and luster are less effective.
3. some are hard to identify and they are so different from each other.

Bethany Awesome Moon said...

1. Many minerals share the same luster or color, so you can narrow it down even more if you use more properteis

2.Density was really effective because each mineral for the most part had its own Density. Color didn't work well at all because a lot of minerals shared the same color.

3. when i got it narrowed down to two minerals and i couldn't tell which one it was

Austin C said...

1. I used properties like luster, streak and hardness. It's important to use more than one property because some rocks share more than one or two properties.
2. Luster, streak and hardness, color, because usually rocks share a common color but not the same luster, streak or hardness.
3. Telling which color it was because it would give you different rocks with different colors but sometimes the rock looked like a couple different colors.

Carson Sitter said...

1. color, streak, and special properties; It gives you more evidence
2.yes; acid and streak; color and magnetism
3. finding halite (the taste):P

Kyle H and Tyler U said...

1. Color, Luster, Hardness, and reactivity.
2. Yes because reactivity and taste would tell you exatly what it is.
3. Identifying if it is metallic or Nonmetallic

Kaylie L. & Haillee D. said...

1. Luster, color, streak, clevage. Some are not as reliable.

2. Streak is better than color. The hardness is better than the luster. The least effective one was color.

3.some of them have most of their properties the same except for a few.

Kahlen M. said...

1.) I used the minerals streak, luster, special properties and hardness.
2.) Yes, because hardness, streak, and special properties because its color and luster change with its outside surroundings.
3.) When it relied on its color because they would change with it's surrounding conditions.

Alise Wagner said...

1) I used color, luster, hardness, shape, density and streak. It is important to use more than one to identify a mineral because some minerals have multiple common factors.
2) The most effective properties were probably the luster, streak, hardness, & density. The least helpful was color, and shape.
3) The most difficult was the umm, I dont really know.

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Sam L. said...

1.) I used the minerals streak, luster, special properties and hardness.
2.) Yes, because hardness, streak, and special properties because its color and luster change with its outside surroundings.
3.) When it relied on its color because they would change with it's surrounding conditions.

christian c & matt c said...

1 color, hardness, shape, luster
because two can have the same properties
2 worst was color because it varries, best was luster because it was always the same for the same mineral
3 determining if it actualy was what it looked like such as luster

Page Wise & Madison Jankowski said...

Proporties :
-Color -Streak -Cleavage/Fracture -Luster -Hardness -Reaction to acid -Taste -Density -Flourescence -Magnetism -Optical Properties -Radioactivity
It is best to use more than 1 or 2 because most minerals have a lot of properties in common, and to determine which one is which you have to see which of them is defferent.

Least effective: would probably be color, because they're are a few ways that can change the color of a mineral.

Most effective: would probably be density, because than you can compare density with with other densities to see what mineral you have.

Many minerals having the same properties

Alex B said...

1. To tell one from another our group use luster and streak and some speacile properties. It is good to use many because one properite can be deciving.
2. Yes, the most efficective was the streak and least was color because color is deciving.
3. Some looked like others.

Brita C. said...

1.Some of the properties you change used to identify a minerals would be luster, hardness, density, cleavage or fracture, also acid tests. You need to use more than one or two properties because you need to provide that you identified the mineral in several different ways.

2. The luster, hardness, and density are good for identifing minerals because they are special properties or unique to them to narrow or limit your search or answers.

3. The most diffcult part about identifing minerals would be deciding the mineral's luster and narrowing your search and answer to one.

Chris J & Courtney M said...

1. Color, streak, luster, hardness, density, chemical reaction. To identify a mineral better.
2. Yes, hardness, density, and chemical reaction, and the least effective are luster, streak, and color.
3. Using luster to identify the mineral.

Elite Ty said...

1.Some ways to identify mineral properties is their color, luster streak, and many more. But it's smarter to use more than just one of these identifiers, since there are minerals with common characteristics, so once identifier might not be enough.
2. There are properties that tend to work better than others. For example, it's harder to tell what a mineral is by it's color, instead of by it's hardness. Definitely color would be the most generic way to identify it by, while acid reactivity would be the most unique, since there are few minerals that have this property.
3. The most difficult part of identifying minerals would probably being finding density, since you have to find the mass and volume in order to calculate density.

brock said...

1. they're are many properties like streak, luster, color, acid, density, and hardness. you should use more than just one of these because oftn times two minerals will share a lot of the same similarities.
2 yes some worked better then others. hardness and streak if it had it worked the best, color tho works the least because a lot of minerals have the same color.
3 the most difficult thing of identifying minerals is their color like if they were perl or white pink because a little difference can be a big thing .

Hannah A said...

1. A few properties minerals can be identified by are color, luster, hardness, and streak. The reason you should use more than one property is because more than one mineral probably has a few of the same properties as another.

2. A few that work really well are luster and streak because they are very unique. One property, imparticular, that doesn't really help much is color.

3. Figuring out exactly what they are. What shape, what color, what color the streak was... It had to be pretty much exact otherwise it may not have turned out right.

JasonS/TylerS said...

1.luster,cleavage,density,streak.its best to use more than one of these methods to be postitive of what mineral you have.
2.density because very few rocks have the same density. least- color a lot of rocks have the same color
3.disinguishing color.

Kasi B said...

1. You can identify minerals by the streak, color, shape, hardness, density, cleavege & fracture, and flourescenes.
2. The most effective ways to identify minerals were hardness, streak, density, and color.
3. The most difficult way to find the identity of a mineral was cleavege and fracture the always got mixed up and u couldn't break the minerals.

Megan H and Madison T said...

1. Streak, hardness. Its better to use more then one because other minerals might have the same property
2. Hardness was one the best ones because it was more accurate than the others. Luster because many minerals have the same luster.
3. When you had some of the same colors and you couldn't tell which mineral to choose.

Austin N. said...

1.some of the propertys that i use are color, making, toghness of scratch and the luster of the mineral. It is a good idea to use more than one propery because some of the minerals have the same propertys.
2.yes, some of them work better. some of the propertys that work really good are its luster, color, and streak. some of the bad ones were toughness and density.
3.The most difficalt part of identifying minerals were there were lots of minerals that looked and had alot of the same propertys

Johnny C said...

1.One way is by the color of the mineral or by the weather it flacks easy or it reacts with a nother substance
it is best to use one or two so u can be sure that your have the correct mineral.
2.yes some of the properties worked better then others like weather it reacted with another substance and the streak it makes but sometimes the color u cant realy on.

3.One difficalt part was when the rocks are a lot the same and it is hard to figure out what mineral is what.

Kelli S. said...

1. Properties that are used to identify minerals are color, luster, density, hardness, and some special properties such as fluorencense and chemical reactivity. Many properties are shared by minerals, so its best to have at least two.
2. Some properties are more effective because less minerals share those properties such as fluorescense and chemical reactivity. Color is a property that is shared with many minerals so its hard to distinguish one mineral from another with it.
3. One challenging part of identifying minerals was when there was two very similar minerals, and it was hard to tell what certain properties were.

Kyla Snaza said...

Kyla Snaza
Period 8.
1) Streak, color, hardness, density, common or unique etc. It's better too test 2 or more properties because that way you can be more accurate about what mineral it is.

2) Some properties are easier to tell than others. Too me, densitity is the easiest. Because no matter who you are or how you think, the answer is the exact same for everyone. I think color and hardness are the hardest because alot of the minerals have the same color or the same hardness.

3) The hardest part of identifying minerals for me is choosing between to minerals that have pretty much the same properties. And by telling what mineral it is by their hardness.
-Kyla Snaza

kody Obermeyer and Luke said...

1 their are things has stercks and hardness,luster and color.yes becasue some have a streck and the hardness is useful when you need a quick answer.
2. second their color is worse then using their streck if you use color their is a whole bunch of red or blue but if you use the streck their should be their own color.
3.Shape and luster.

Dylan T. said...

1. It is better to use more that 2 properties because than you can be more percise on your answer for the mineral.
2.The properties that were most affective were the ones that looked like gold. The least affective would be the properties that are hard to tell.
3.The most difficult part of identifying minerals was by their taste.

Nate B said...

1. The properties I look for to distinguish one mineral from another, I use things like luster, reactivity, and density. It is essential to look at all characteristics because some mineral have some similar characteristic but you only need to find one non-similar characteristic.

2. Some characteritics like streak, luster, and density helped me the most for identifying minerals. Things like color and hardness can be deceiving because most minerals are similar in those two categories.

3. The hardest thing to identify minerals by was the hardness, color, and luster. I say this because most of those seventeen minerals were very similar in those aspects.

Alexis I. said...

1. Color, luster, streak, cleavage, fracture, density, and hardness are all a few propreties taht we use to distinguish minerals. It's a good idea to use more then one of these properties because that gives you a better chance of indentifying the exact miineral your looking for.

2. Some properties are more accurate then others and you use them more commonly. Hardness on Mohs scale is one example and it's streak or class of luster that is belongs to was effective. Color is not very effective since there are so manny colors to choose from.

3. I think it was easy to put it into a class but then narrowing it down to one certain mineral was the toughest part.

Ashley Rademacher and Katlynn Paasch said...

1. Some of these properties are color of streaks because thats better than color. Another one is luster because if its dull then its not alot of minerals.
2. Yes they did like streak because thats better than color. Also hardness is better than fracture and cleavage.
3. Looking at all the steps and figuring out wich mineral is wich.

spencer d said...

1. case if you onley have one property it may not be as nice or diffrent.
2. some propertys are harder and some are shinyer then others it all depends what property it is.
3. the hardst part is finding what kind of miniral it is.

Taylor Lafollette said...

1. Way's to identify minerals are things such as color, luster, streak, fracture of cleavage, hardness, and density are the most commen ways to identify a mineral. you need to use more then one so you can have less choices on what it is.

2.in my opinion luster and hardness are the easiest ways to identify a mineral because they narrow down the choices even more then other ways. the hardest things to use to identify a mineral is color because it doesn't narrow the choices down very much.

3. the most difficult part about identifying minerals are finding the luster because the luster is not allways easy to identify on a mineral.

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