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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 9 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. How many land animal bones were found?
  2. 2. What would you expect in a layer that was once a forest?
  3. 3. What kinds of living thing are in this layer?
  4. 4. What claim does this record support?
2.Fossil coral is found on a hillside far from the sea. What does that suggest?
  • A.The coral walked there
  • B.Coral grows on hills
  • C.The land was once under a warm shallow sea
3.Some fossils are of organisms with no living species at all. What does that tell you?
  • A.Every kind of living thing is still alive
  • B.Fossils are not real
  • C.Some kinds of living thing that once lived have died out
4.A fossil footprint has three toes and is the size of a dinner plate. What does it tell you?
  • A.The rock is new
  • B.A bird is still nesting here
  • C.A large animal once walked across soft ground here
5.Fossil palm leaves are found in a country with icy winters. What does that suggest?
  • A.The climate there was once much warmer
  • B.Palms grow in snow
  • C.Somebody planted them
6.Ammonites have no living species, but they look like today's nautilus. What does that suggest?
  • A.Ammonites lived in the sea, as the nautilus does
  • B.Ammonites lived in trees
  • C.Ammonites are still alive
7.Mammoth bones are found with thick woolly hair. How was a mammoth unlike a living elephant?
  • A.It had thick hair for a much colder climate
  • B.It could fly
  • C.It lived in the sea

LessonPrint · 3-LS4-1 · Set 9 · free to copy for classroom use

Answer key — What the Quarry Held

Set 9. Prints on its own sheet.

  1. 1.1. No land animal bones at all. 2. Fern fronds and land animal bones rather than sea urchins. 3. Sea creatures: ammonites, sea urchins and fish. 4. Fossils give evidence of the organisms and the environments of long ago.
  2. 2.The land was once under a warm shallow sea
  3. 3.Some kinds of living thing that once lived have died out
  4. 4.A large animal once walked across soft ground here
  5. 5.The climate there was once much warmer
  6. 6.Ammonites lived in the sea, as the nautilus does
  7. 7.It had thick hair for a much colder climate

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