What is Melted rock?

Melted rock is like hot lava that flows from a volcano.

Imagine you have a big chocolate bar. When it's cold, it’s solid and hard to bite into. But when you put it in the microwave, it gets hot and starts to melt, becoming soft and runny. That's kind of what happens with rock deep inside the Earth. It gets super hot and turns from a solid into a liquid, just like melted chocolate.

Deep under the ground, there’s heat, lots of it! This heat can come from moving parts in the Earth, kind of like when you shake a bottle of soda and it gets warm. When rock gets hot enough, it starts to melt, turning into what we call magma. If that magma comes out of a volcano, it’s called lava, the same stuff that makes big fiery rivers on the ground.

Think about when you pour hot chocolate from a cup into a mug. The liquid moves and spreads out. Melted rock does something similar underground, it flows through cracks and can even rise up to make volcanoes or new land, just like hot chocolate fills a mug!