Guide students in developing a class focus question about the phenomenon. How do we know the environment used to be different?

Fossils are preserved remains or traces of organisms. Paleontologists excavate fossils and study them to learn about the organisms of the past.

From fossils like that of the mammoth, we can learn a lot about what has happened long ago. Students will analyze data from fossils to learn what the environment was like long ago.

Students will research temperatures of different cities in particular seasons to compare the weather patterns around the U.S. Students question why Mammoth fossils were found in an area with high temperatures today.

Students will research and compare the climates and sizes of different prehistoric megafauna. Climates around the world include polar, dry, continental, temperate, and tropical. The climate is not the same as when the mammoths and megafauna lived here.

Students will connect the ideas of changes in an environment to changes and adaptations in the animals that live there. Environments change and organisms living there adapt, move, or die.

Local paleontologists and museum curators are working together to ensure no more animals end up on the extinct list. They have hired you as an environmental scientist to provide insight and design a solution for their current problem of bald eagles not having enough nesting space. Includes a Claim, Evidence, Reasoning writing activity with rubric.

A Socratic seminar is a methodology that allows open, polite, deep discussion on a topic. Students freely express their thoughts and ideas without the fear of ridicule, or wrong answers. Students engage in respectful conversation where they justify their thoughts and listen to the ideas of others.