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What the Quarry Held is a free printable Grade 3 science worksheet on comparing fossil organisms with living ones to infer a past environment, aligned to NGSS performance expectation 3-LS4-1. It prints 7 questions with an answer key on its own sheet of paper, in 25 versions that each ask different questions, so no two students in the class work from the same page. Print it from the browser or download it as a PDF — no account, no email.

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What the Quarry Held

3-LS4-1

NameDate

Read the record, then answer the questions.

1.Read the record, then answer the questions.

What the Quarry Held

A list of fossils found in one rock layer at a quarry, from the museum's record card. FOSSILS IN ONE LAYER Ammonites ............ 24 Sea urchins .......... 11 Fish scales .......... 7 Fern fronds .......... 0 Land animal bones .... 0 The rock is a fine gray limestone.

  1. 1. What claim does this record support?
  2. 2. How many ammonites were found?
  3. 3. Why record what was NOT found as well as what was?
  4. 4. What does that suggest about this place long ago?
2.Some fossils are of organisms with no living species at all. What does that tell you?
  • A.Some kinds of living thing that once lived have died out
  • B.Every kind of living thing is still alive
  • C.Fossils are not real
3.Mammoth bones are found with thick woolly hair. How was a mammoth unlike a living elephant?
  • A.It lived in the sea
  • B.It could fly
  • C.It had thick hair for a much colder climate
4.Ammonites have no living species, but they look like today's nautilus. What does that suggest?
  • A.Ammonites are still alive
  • B.Ammonites lived in the sea, as the nautilus does
  • C.Ammonites lived in trees
5.Fossil palm leaves are found in a country with icy winters. What does that suggest?
  • A.Palms grow in snow
  • B.The climate there was once much warmer
  • C.Somebody planted them
6.Why compare a fossil with a living organism?
  • A.To make the fossil heavier
  • B.A living relative shows how the fossil organism probably lived
  • C.To see which is older
7.Fossil sea urchins look almost like living ones. What can you say about how they lived?
  • A.They lived in deserts
  • B.They lived in the air
  • C.They probably lived on the sea floor, as living ones do

LessonPrint · 3-LS4-1 · Set 10 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — What the Quarry Held

Set 10. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. Fossils give evidence of the organisms and the environments of long ago. 2. 24 ammonites. 3. The absence of land bones and fern fronds is part of the evidence. 4. It was under the sea, because only sea creatures are fossilized here.
  2. 2.Some kinds of living thing that once lived have died out
  3. 3.It had thick hair for a much colder climate
  4. 4.Ammonites lived in the sea, as the nautilus does
  5. 5.The climate there was once much warmer
  6. 6.A living relative shows how the fossil organism probably lived
  7. 7.They probably lived on the sea floor, as living ones do

Last reviewed 2026-09-05. Aligned to 3-LS4-1 of the Next Generation Science Standards.