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

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Set 1 has all 25 in a single PDF. All 25 sets ask different questions.

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. How many land animal bones were found?
2.Why compare a fossil with a living organism?
  • A.To see which is older
  • B.To make the fossil heavier
  • C.A living relative shows how the fossil organism probably lived
3.A fossil fern is found in a cold, dry place today. What does it suggest about the past?
  • A.The fossil was carried there yesterday
  • B.Ferns like cold deserts
  • C.The place was once warm and wet enough for ferns
4.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
5.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
6.Fossil coral is found on a hillside far from the sea. What does that suggest?
  • A.The land was once under a warm shallow sea
  • B.Coral grows on hills
  • C.The coral walked there
7.Some fossils are of organisms with no living species at all. What does that tell you?
  • A.Fossils are not real
  • B.Every kind of living thing is still alive
  • C.Some kinds of living thing that once lived have died out

LessonPrint · 3-LS4-1 · Set 6 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — What the Quarry Held

Set 6. 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. No land animal bones at all.
  2. 2.A living relative shows how the fossil organism probably lived
  3. 3.The place was once warm and wet enough for ferns
  4. 4.They probably lived on the sea floor, as living ones do
  5. 5.It had thick hair for a much colder climate
  6. 6.The land was once under a warm shallow sea
  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.