Wooly Mammoth

To culminate our Unit 2 in science, we had fun creating fossils yesterday and also viewed this news story about the discovery of a wooly mammoth in Siberia that was so in tact that paleontologists were able to extract DNA from it! The students were absolutely mesmerized as they learned more about such a well-preserved 40,000 year-old whole body fossil. (To view the entire documentary, click here.)

It has been a fascinating journey as we've considered the interdependence of organisms in ecosystems (how plants and animals depend on each other for survival), the effects of changes on a habitat (such as fires, landslides, deforestation, pollution, and invasive species), ecosystem engineers (like in the example of the wolves in Yellowstone National Park), various types of fossils (trace, cast or mold, and whole body), and an inquiry to determine what fossils can tell us about the plants, animals, climate, habitat, and problems of a particular geographic area.

After our spring break, we will be returning to Social Studies for about 5 weeks and then we'll finish the year with our last two science units.

We are all looking forward to learning even more in these last few units!

PS. For further reading about the wooly mammoth, you may enjoy this.