The document provides instructions and questions for a classroom bell ringer activity about fossils, including what fossils are, how they form, and how tree rings can indicate past weather; it also asks students to make assumptions about an area based on finding seashell casts, petrified wood, and to provide class rules for group work and listening.

1. Bell Ringer
• Take out a sheet of paper, put your name, block
number and date
• You may NOT use books or notes!
• Answer the following questions
• What are fossils?
• How do fossils form?
• How can you use tree rings to tell what the weather
was like in the early 1600’s?
• If you found a cast and mold of a seashell and some
petrified wood what can you assume about what the
area use to be?
• When you are done, place it in your class bin

2. Bell Ringer
• Take out a piece of paper and answer the
following questions
– Write 2 rules that the class should be following
during group work
– Write 2 rules that the class should follow when
listening to me
– Write 1 thing you as students expect from me

3. Fossils and
The Law of Superposition
LEQ: How do you use the Law of
Superposition to Identify the age of a
Fossil?

4. Fossils and Superposition
 What is a fossil?
The trace or remains of an organism
that lived long ago, most commonly
preserved in sedimentary rock
 What is a superposition?
Younger rocks lie above older rocks

5. Relative Dating and Index Fossils
 What is relative dating?
◦ A method of determining if something is older or
younger then another object.
 What is an index fossil?
◦ A fossil that is found in the rock layers of only one
geologic age and is used to establish the age of the
rock layers.

6. Activity # 1
• On your desk, you have 8 large colored index
cards with nonsense letters placed on them.
• Your task is to determine what the correct
sequence of the letters are.
• You have two clues:
1. The card with the letters “C” and “T” is on the
bottom, or the oldest layer
2. Look for a card that has either a “T” or “C”
written on it for the second layer
 You have 15 minutes

7. This is one possible way to arrange the cards.
Answer the Following Questions:
MD 1.What letter is the oldest?
DXO 2.What letter is the youngest?
3.What letter showed up the most?
4.Which letters only showed up once?
ON 5.Which letters could be index fossils?
6.How did you know which was older: “M”
NB or “X”?
NBU
UA
AGC
CT

8. Activity # 2
• Flip your eight index cards over
• Arrange the index cards that represent
layers of rock and fossils
• Clues:
1. The oldest layer has the letter “M” in it
2. Find a rock layer that has at least one of the
fossils you found in the oldest rock layer
3. Extinction is forever - once an organism
disappears from the sequence it cannot
reappear later

11. Answer the Following Questions…
• In complete sentences
– What problems did you run into when trying to
arrange the fossils into the correct sequence?
– Would this have been more difficult if you did not
know which layer was the oldest to start the
activity?
– Which organism is the most complex of all the
fossils and why?