Based on the geological conditions of overburden rock, the dynamic development law of overburden breakage was investigated by theoretical analysis and similarity model experiments in this paper. the formula of the compressive strength and no. ratio was obtained by testing the compressive strength of cylinder samples of similar materials. it can be seen from the overburden fracture evolution model established by theoretical calculations and similarity model experiments that the overlying rock layer's breakage law is consistent. Additionally, the height of the "three zones" and the law of the fracture angle are basically consistent. obtaining the synchronous collapse of the overlying strata controlled by the key strata, the interval of the upper key strata is larger than that of the lower key strata, and the mining interval is approximately double the size of the deformed rock height. According to the overburden movement, the distribution law of the overburden separation rate is obtained. The strain in the stress concentration area is negative, and when the stress is released suddenly, the strain increases rapidly. Fracture development is detected by the p-wave velocity in the model. Moreover, certain guidance for the horizon selection of high and low-level gas drainage roadways is provided by this study.Coal is asignificant source of energy 1-3 , but the production process is often disastrous. It is very important for the mining face pressure control and the horizon selection of high-and low-level drainage roadways to explore the dynamic development law of overlying strata breakage. According to the traditional "three zones" theory 4-7 , when the mining face moves forward, the roof strata will hang out and then fail, forming a caving zone, a fractured zone and a bending subsidence zone. The "three zones" have their own characteristics of rock strata movement and deformation.Many research results on mine pressure and rock strata movement have been reported; among them, the key stratum theory is the mainstream theory at present [8][9][10][11][12][13] . He et al. 14 analyzed the mechanisms of mining tremors caused by key strata movement and instability. Sun et al. 15 proposed a similar hyperbolic settlement model to describe the movement and failure of internal loads. Fan and Liu 16 proposed a conceptual model of broken rock mass compaction by elastic theory. Luan et al. 17 determined that the thickness and span of key strata have a more dominant effect on the stability of key strata compared with other factors, and the increase in uncertainty levels leads toa decrease in the stability probability. Liang et al. 18 showed that in a fully mechanized mining face with a high mining height, the first subordinate key layer has two structural forms and six types of movement. Xie and Xu 19 researched the key stratum effect on the mining abutment pressure of a coal seam. Han et al. 20 presenteda method to calculate the working surface abutment pressure by key strata theory. Gao et al. 21 demonstrated that the first fractur...