Paleontology ›  Unit 4

Unit 4 The Jurassic

Pangaea tears apart, sauropods reach sizes no land animal had managed before, marine reptiles hunt the new seas, and the first birds appear. Ends with you choosing the one dig site that can answer a museum's question.

🕐 10 class days🅰️ 4 Activities🅿️ 2 Projects🅱️ 1 Problem
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The Path Through Unit 4

The museum can afford exactly one summer dig. The board has narrowed it to three Jurassic sites, and they want you to pick. Read the full case →
4.1Giants on a splitting continent4 days
PProject🕐 2 class days

P4.1.3  Feeding a Giant

Estimate a sauropod's body mass from its leg-bone measurements, then work out how much plant food it needed each day and how much forest that takes. Getting a number is quick; explaining how whole herds of them fit on the Morrison floodplain is the real task.

Turn in: Mass estimate + daily food budget with a land-area calculationOpen →
4.2Into the sea and the sky4 days
PProject🕐 2 class days

P4.2.3  Who Ate What?

England's Oxford Clay preserves several marine reptiles that hunted the same sea at the same time. Use their tooth shapes, body sizes, and known stomach contents to work out who ate what, then build a food web showing how they avoided competing.

Turn in: Tooth-shape comparison chart + marine food webOpen →
4.3Unit problem2 days
BProblem🕐 2 class days

B4.3.1  One Season, Three Sites

A museum has money for one summer dig and three Jurassic sites to choose from: Colorado's Morrison Formation, England's Oxford Clay, and Germany's Solnhofen limestone. Decide which site best answers the museum's question about how Jurassic animals shared food and space, predict what you'd find and what you'd miss, and defend your pick.

Turn in: Grant proposal with a site comparison tableOpen →