3rd Grade Science Force – Fossils
Name:
Station #1: Fossil Hunting
When finding fossils, paleontologists tag every fossil with a Curating
Card that contains information about their find. Curate means “to take
care” and is the way a museum keeps details about its collections.
Choose your favorite fossil find and complete a Curating Card.
Catalog Number:
Type of Animal:
Genus and Species:
Formation:
Locality:
Age:
Collector:
Date of Accession (find):
Description/sketch of item:
3rd Grade Fossils Lab Sheet – Revision 5 02/17/16
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3rd Grade Science Force – Fossils
Station #2: Casts and Molds
At this station we will make molds and casts using Model Magic.
1. What kinds of molds did you make?
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2. What kinds of casts did you make?___________________________
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3. How does a mold differ from a cast?
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A mold is an impression of an animal’s body made in a firm sediment
such as mud. Imagine a dinosaur falling dead in a swampy, muddy
place. Eventually, its body decays but the impression (the mold) may
remain. If the mold is filled with another sediment, such as sand or pond
sediment, a cast is formed. The cast takes on the shape of the fossil.
Footprints are a special kind of mold, called a trace fossil. Other types of
trace fossils include nests, burrows, gastroliths (gizzard stones), tooth
marks, and coprolites (fossilized feces).
3rd Grade Fossils Lab Sheet – Revision 5 02/17/16
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3rd Grade Science Force – Fossils
Station #3: Fossil Identification Timeline
A fossil is any evidence of ancient life. This evidence may be the actual
remains, such as bone, teeth, shell, or plant tissues; chemically altered
remains; or traces of the activities of extinct organisms, such as burrows
and tracks.
At this station you will examine many types of fossils. You will predict
as well as identify the fossil, list what era it belongs to and how many
years ago it existed as well as when it went extinct.
Predict what the
fossil is:
Actual Name of the
fossil:
Era
Time Period –
Extinct?
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
3rd Grade Fossils Lab Sheet – Revision 5 02/17/16
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3rd Grade Science Force – Fossils
Station #4 : Fossil Identification
This is a guide to some of the fossils that will be seen at this station.
PETRIFIED WOOD
Wood fossilizes into stone through a mineral displacement process
where silicon rich mineral penetrate into the wood and eventually
hardens or fossilizes into stone, taking the shape and form of the wood.
We have several examples here. a limb with one end polished, a piece
that is a part of the trunk of the tree and several tumbled and polished
pieces.
AMBER
Baltic amber is the fossilized resin or sap from extinct prehistoric
coniferous pine trees that formed huge forests 40 - 60 million years ago
at the present location of the Baltic Sea. This lightest of organic gems
sometimes has inclusions of entrapped flora, fauna and insects and
provides a connection with our past.
FOSSIL COPROLITE
Fossilized dung (feces) from Cenozoic Era reptiles, primarily turtles,
from the Cretaceous age approximately 100 million years ago. The two
specimens you see are from Washington State.
FERN FOSSILS
These natural wonders fell into a bog where a low temperature, low
pressure, oxygen depleted environment evolved the plant tissue into
pyrite.
3rd Grade Fossils Lab Sheet – Revision 5 02/17/16
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