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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.

Set 13 of 25 · the same problems every time you open this link.

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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 would you expect in a layer that was once a forest?
  2. 2. What kinds of living thing are in this layer?
  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.Mammoth bones are found with thick woolly hair. How was a mammoth unlike a living elephant?
  • A.It could fly
  • B.It had thick hair for a much colder climate
  • C.It lived in the sea
3.A fossil fern is found in a cold, dry place today. What does it suggest about the past?
  • A.The place was once warm and wet enough for ferns
  • B.The fossil was carried there yesterday
  • C.Ferns like cold deserts
4.Fossil palm leaves are found in a country with icy winters. What does that suggest?
  • A.Somebody planted them
  • B.Palms grow in snow
  • C.The climate there was once much warmer
5.A fossil footprint has three toes and is the size of a dinner plate. What does it tell you?
  • A.A large animal once walked across soft ground here
  • B.The rock is new
  • C.A bird is still nesting here
6.Fossil sea urchins look almost like living ones. What can you say about how they lived?
  • A.They probably lived on the sea floor, as living ones do
  • B.They lived in the air
  • C.They lived in deserts
7.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

LessonPrint · 3-LS4-1 · Set 13 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — What the Quarry Held

Set 13. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. Fern fronds and land animal bones rather than sea urchins. 2. Sea creatures: ammonites, sea urchins and fish. 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.It had thick hair for a much colder climate
  3. 3.The place was once warm and wet enough for ferns
  4. 4.The climate there was once much warmer
  5. 5.A large animal once walked across soft ground here
  6. 6.They probably lived on the sea floor, as living ones do
  7. 7.Some kinds of living thing that once lived have died out

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