What does a palaeontologist do?

Preparation

• Source reference books, the internet or pictures on posters containing fossils and palaeontologists at work (optional) for students to view.

Curriculum links

• Australian Curriculum: ACSSU044, ACSIS053, ACSIS057, ACSIS060
• NSW Curriculum: ST2-4LW-S, ST2-1WS-S
• VIC Curriculum: VCSSU056, VCSSU057, VCSIS065, VCSIS069, VCSIS072
• WA Curriculum: ACSSU044, ACSIS053, ACSIS057, ACSIS060

Suggested teaching strategies

Introduction

• Display the digital lesson on your smartboard to introduce the palaeontologist profession.
• The student summary and worksheet should be used together.

Development

• Provide students with printable versions of the student summary and worksheet. Have students complete the worksheet.

Differentiation

• Investigation sheet could partially be completed as a class.

Conclusion

• Discuss the investigation sheet as a class and the answers everybody came up with.

Assessment

Worksheet answers

1. Possible answers: discovers fossils; studies fossils; digs out, cleans, repairs and puts fossils back together.
2. Answers could indicate ‘yes’ because the word is from a Latin one meaning ‘dug up’, which is what happens to fossils.
3. (a) bones, teeth, claws (b) animal droppings/nests/eggs/footprints
4. A plant doesn’t have hard parts like bones.
5. It must be gently covered by fine sand or mud before it decays and disappears.
6. Possible answers: (a) how old a fossil is (b) what kind of plant it was, like a fern or a palm (c) if an animal walked on two or four legs/size of animal (d) what the animal ate Investigation sheet answers Answers should indicate: 1. First fossil is a plant (as it is a frond). Second is an animal as it looks like a bone. 2. Body of an insect with a head and thin legs, and wings. Looks like a moth or butterfly. 3. Walked on two legs, had a tail, large head, large jaw, sharp teeth, claws on hands, probably a fierce creature that ate other animals. (Some students may work out it is a T-rex dinosaur skeleton.) 4. Lived in a marine environment as they are fossils of a fish, shells and a starfish. 5. The tracks show a smaller animal’s footprints being followed by a larger animal’s footprints. The larger animal caught the smaller one. They had a struggle and the smaller one was killed and eaten. The larger one walked away, leaving a few bones.

Investigation sheet answers

Answers should indicate:
1. First fossil is a plant (as it is a frond). Second is an animal as it looks like a bone.
2. Body of an insect with a head and thin legs, and wings. Looks like a moth or butterfly.
3. Walked on two legs, had a tail, large head, large jaw, sharp teeth, claws on hands, probably a fierce creature that ate other animals. (Some students may work out it is a T-rex dinosaur skeleton.)
4. Lived in a marine environment as they are fossils of a fish, shells and a starfish.
5. The tracks show a smaller animal’s footprints being followed by a larger animal’s footprints. The larger animal caught the smaller one. They had a struggle and the smaller one was killed and eaten. The larger one walked away, leaving a few bones.