Minerals and Uses Memory Matching Game

Instructions

1. Print out the tile pages of the activity packet below. The tile pages should be printed two-sided with the flip edge set as the short edge.
2. Cut out the tiles.
3. Shuffle the tiles and spread them out with the mineral names and uses sides down.
4. Players take turns to flip over two tiles, searching for the mineral and uses pair that has the same background image. If the tiles are a match, the player keeps the matching pair and takes another turn. If the tiles are not a match, the tiles are turned back over, and it is the next players turn.
5. The game continues until all the tiles have been matched. The player with the most pairs wins the game!

Vocabulary

• Chemical elements: Chemical substances distinguished by atomic number.
• Critical minerals: A non-fuel mineral or mineral material essential to the economic and national security of the US, the supply chain of which is vulnerable to disruption, and that serves an essential function in the manufacturing of a product, the absence of which would have significant consequences for our economy or our national security.
• Mineral: a naturally occurring, inorganic, solid with specific atomic structure and controlled chemical composition.
• Mineral deposits: Deposits in which particular minerals are concentrated, typically noticed and studied if the minerals have economic value.
• Mineral resources: Natural occurrences of useful inorganic elements or compounds.
• Ore: a mineral or mineral resource containing a valuable constituent (for example, the mineral sphalerite is mined for zinc) for which it is mined.
• Periodic table: an organization of chemical elements based on atomic number and other atomic properties.
• Trace and minor elements: an element that occurs in lower amounts in a mineral and are NOT a main component for the chemical formula of the mineral. For example, the chemical formula for sphalerite is ZnS. Indium (In) can substitute for the zinc (Zn) in sphalerite. This is why, even though the chemical formula for sphalerite doesn't have In, the mineral sphalerite is actually the main In-bearing mineral (aka source for indium).