What are hot spots?

Hot spots are places where something gets really hot because lots of energy is happening all at once.

Imagine you're playing with a toy car that goes vrrrrrrrmmmm and zooms around the room. Now imagine there are hundreds of these toy cars, all driving super fast on a tiny track inside a big box. The more cars you have, and the faster they go, the hotter that box gets, just like when you rub your hands together really fast, they get warm.

Hot spots work in a similar way but with something called magma, which is like super-heated rock deep under the Earth. When magma moves up toward the surface, it can create hot spots, areas where the ground gets very hot and sometimes even causes volcanoes or new land to form.

Think of your stove as the Earth. If you turn on one burner, it's like a regular volcano. But if you turn on all the burners at once, or maybe even put a pot of boiling water on top, that’s like a hot spot! It gets super hot and can make things cook really fast, just like how hot spots can make new land appear quickly.