Name(s): ________________________________________________________________

Geologic Time Project – History & Development of Our PlanetGroup 1: Time Breakdowns

Directions: Split your ticker tape into 3 LONG sections. The top section should be your eons, the middle will be your eras, and then the bottom will be your periods (see example below).

Label and Color each so we can easily recognize how time is broken down.

Then create a key explaining how each subsection is divided.

Measurements (Given in millions of years ago) based on a 5 meter long piece of ticker tape

Eons

Phanerozoic = Present – 540,000,000

Proterozoic = 540,000,000 – 2,500,000,000

Archean = 2,500,000,000 – 3,800,000,000

Hadean 3,800,000,000 – 4,500,000,000

****Convert all numbers to centimeters by moving the decimal SEVEN places to the LEFT!!!

Eras

Cenozoic = Present – 65,000,000

Mesozoic = 65,000,000 – 248,000,000

Paleozoic = 248,000,000 – 540,000,000

Precambrian = 540,000,000 – 4,500,000,000

Periods

Quaternary Period= Present – 1,800,000

Tertiary Period= 1,800,000 – 65,000,000

Cretaceous Period = 65,000,000 -144,000,000

Jurassic Period = 144,000,000 – 206,000,000

Triassic Period = 206,000,000 – 248,000,000

Permian Period = 248,000,000 – 290,000,000

Carboniferous P. = 290,000,000 – 354,000,000

Devonian Period = 354,000,000 – 417,000,000

Silurian Period = 417,000,000 – 443,000,000

Ordovician Period = 443,000,000 -490,000,000

Cambrian Period 490,000,000 – 543,000,000

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________

Background: How old is the Earth? If the Earth celebrated its birthday every million years, there would be 4,600 candles on its birthday cake! Humans have been around only long enough to light the last candle on the cake. Because the Earth is 4.6 billion years old, geologists have created a geologic time scale to make their job of studying Earth’s history easier. The geologic time scale is a standard method used to divide the Earth’s long history into smaller parts. Just as your life’s history is broken up into sections, the history of the Earth is broken up into smaller sections called eons. Your history can be broken up into sections and labeled as birth, elementary years, middle school years, high school years, professional years, etc. Eons can be broken down even further, they call these eras. Just think how your school years can be broken down into grades (elementary = 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.). Eras can be further broken down to periods. Think of this like every 9 weeks in each grade.

So, Eons are the largest division of geologic time. Each eon is defined by life formation. Eons are then broken down into Eras, which are defined by mass extinction. Each Era is then further divided into periods, which are defined by fossils.

Geologic Time Project – History & Development of

Our PlanetGroup 2: Atmosphere & Water

Directions: Section off each of the atmospheres and add in the dates and events.

Using the other information, create a short summary on an index card or a ¼ sheet of paper.

A good idea would be to color each section based on what was happening at the time.

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________ Primordial Atmosphere (4,600,000,000 – 4,000,000,000 Years)

o Origin of the Earth = 4,600,000,000 Years Agoo Collision that Formed the Moon = 4,450,000,000 Years Ago

Composition: Methane, Ammonia, Water Vapor, Small Amounts of Nitrogen & CO2 (Carbon dioxide)

Extremely high temps converted methane into CO (Carbon Monoxide) and Hydrogen

2nd Atmosphere (4,000,000,000 Years – 2,500,000,000 Years Ago)o Meteorite Bombardment = 3,900,000,000 Years Ago

Earth cooled & water vapor turned liquido Million year rain & produce oceans = 3,800,000,000 Years Ago

Mix of water & gases created acid rain, adding new minerals to Earth’s surface

o 1st day without clouds = 3,700,000,000 Years Agoo End: Left the atmosphere mainly nitrogen & CO2

3rd Atmosphere (2,500,000,000 – 540,000,000 Years Ago)o Anaerobic life dominanto Overtime changed Hydrogen & CO2 Methane & Water & Sulfateso Organisms use photosynthesis = 3,500,000,000 Years Ago

Organisms began to convert CO2 (Carbon dioxide) + H2O (water) O2 (Oxygen) + Sugars = (photosynthesis)

o Sunlight increased in intensity = 2,100,000,000 Years Agoo Ozone layer formed = 2,400,000,000 Years Agoo Anaerobic life started to die with increase of oxygen making way for aerobic

life (about 10% Oxygen) Present Atmosphere (540,000,000 Years Ago – Present)

o Great Oxidation Event = 2,300,000,000 Years Ago Most oxygen was used to oxidize minerals on the surface & in the

oceanso Mass Extinction Event = 251,000,000 Years Ago

Mass Extinction (volcanic eruptions) made CO2 increaseo Return of Plants = 228,000,000 Years Ago

Return of plants made our present atmosphereo Composition Today: 78% Nitrogen, 21% Oxygen, 1% Mix of Argon, CO2, Neon,

& Trace Gases

Patterns? (Attach this as a summary)

• With an increase in CO2 (Carbon dioxide) – the planet is hotter Volcanoes, Animals

• With an increase in O2 (Oxygen) – the planet is cooler Plants, Bacteria

****Convert all numbers to centimeters by moving the decimal SEVEN places to the LEFT!!!

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________

What is the “Oxygenation Catastrophe”? (summarize this article)Approximately 2.3 billion years ago, Earth could have been easily mistaken for a hostile alien planet. Methane spewed into the atmosphere by constant volcanic activity, and fatal UV radiation bombarded the surface without the protection of an ozone layer. The primordial seas were blood red, a hue caused by the massive amounts of suspended iron in the water. It is beneath these red waves in which almost all life on the planet survived, most of which would require a microscope to view. Anaerobic single celled organisms were the dominant life form on earth at the time; they lived in the hostile chemical makeup of the primordial sea without the need of oxygen. However just one of these single celled organisms may have caused the greatest extinction event on planet Earth: the Cyanobacteria.

What was formerly known as blue-green algae, the Cyanobacteria are actually bacteria that have the unique ability of photosynthesis. This single-celled organism had emerged only a few hundred millions years before, at a time where all other organisms relied on methods of anaerobic respiration. By creating its own energy from the sun, this bacterium was able to generate up to 16 times more energy than its counterparts, which allowed it to outcompete and explode in reproduction. This seemingly innocent organism would spell doom for most of life on the planet, as photosynthesis produced free oxygen molecules as a byproduct.

Oxygen was a poisonous element to the dominant life on the planet at the time, anaerobic bacteria. In the primordial waters, oxygen molecules would normally be absorbed by decomposing organisms or would bind with iron in the water to create rust, so oxygen did not have time to accumulate. We can see in the geological record that 2.3 billion years ago, there was a highly unusual amount of rust being deposited on the ocean floor. We know based on this evidence that there was a huge spike of oxygen in ocean at this time. It is thought that Cyanobacteria werw producing so much oxygen that it reached complete global saturation. With this, oxygen began to leave the waters and accumulate in the atmosphere, which would have profound effects on the planet.

In a relatively short amount of time, Earth went from having very little oxygen to what may be the highest levels of atmospheric oxygen it has ever had. This event had wiped out most of life on the planet to which the oxygen was poisonous. Some of these anaerobic organisms were though to have survived by burrowing into the earth where oxygen levels were survivable. What may have the biggest change is that when oxygen accumulated in the methane rich atmosphere, the concentration of this greenhouse gas dwindled, causing temperature levels to drop. They dropped so low in fact, that this oxygen event is thought to have triggered the Huronian glaciation, the longest snowball Earth period.

Over 2.3 billions years later, Cyanobacteria is still among us and continues to produce oxygen. Its byproduct is now an essential part of the earth’s atmosphere and a necessity for survival for many forms of life. This great oxygen event is credited with drastically changing the make- up of the planet, giving birth to

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________thousands of new minerals, an environment where multi-cellular organisms could evolve, and the cooling of earth’s temperature.

Geologic Time Project – History & Development of Our PlanetGroup 3: Land Development

Directions: Plot the dates and events on the timeline.

Draw or add a picture to illustrate each stage of the Earth.

If a section has/needs a summary, create a short summary on index cards or ¼ sheet of paper and attach.

Major Events

Solar Nebula = 4,600,000,000 Years Agoo Distance from Sun (SUMMARY)

The habitable zone, sometimes referred to as the “Goldilocks Zone,” is the region around a star that has just the right conditions to find liquid water on a planet's surface. And liquid water is a key ingredient in the search for life.

Origin of the Earth = 4,540,000,000 Years Agoo Magnetic Field – Spinning liquid metal outer core generates a magnetic field

that protects the planet (SUMMARY)o Composition – A planet’s composition determines the soil type (original

bedrock material), layers of the Earth, etc. (SUMMARY) Collision formed the Moon = 4,450,000,000 Years Ago Earth cooled = 4,400,000,000 Years Ago Meteorite Bombardment = 3,900,000,000 Years Ago Rain =3,800,000,000 Years Ago – created the oceans One solid massive continent surrounded by water:

o Rodinia & Panthalassa Ocean = 750,000,000 Years Agoo Pangaea = 300,000,000 Years Agoo Laurasia & Gondwana = 150,000,000 Years Agoo Early Continents = 100,000,000 Years Agoo Present Continents = 40,000,000 Years Ago

Original Surface (SUMMARY)

Soil – Development of Soilo Soils differ from one part of the world to another, and even from one part of a

backyard to another. They differ because of where and how they formed. Over

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________time, five major factors control how a soil forms. They are climate, organisms, relief (landscape), parent material, and time--or CLORPT, for short.

o Every soil originally formed from parent material: a deposit at the Earth’s surface. The material could have been bedrock that weathered in place or smaller materials carried by flooding rivers, moving glaciers, or blowing winds. Over time, sun, water, wind, ice, and living creatures help transform, or change, the parent material into soil.

o As a soil ages, it gradually starts to look different from its parent material. That’s because soil is dynamic. Its components—minerals, water, air, organic matter, and organisms—constantly change. Some components are added. Some are lost. Some move from place to place within the soil. And some components are transformed into others.

****Convert all numbers to centimeters by moving the decimal SEVEN places to the LEFT!!!

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________

Geologic Time Project – History & Development of Our PlanetGroup 4: Surface Development

Directions: Read each section and give a summary of each topic on an index card or ¼ sheet of paper.

Plot the dates and use blue and red to show warmer and cooler temperatures.

When possible use pictures to help show the events of the timeline.

****Convert all numbers to centimeters by moving the decimal SEVEN places to the LEFT!!!

Major Events

How is the surface altered?

Wind – Blows soil from one place to anothero More extreme in hot/dry places (Oasis)

Gravity – Causes soil and rock to fall

o Rock Slides o Landslides o Avalanches

Watero Shorelines – Causes the shorelines to change that can affect evidence to the

past Waves/Development of Oceans

Pangaea = 300,000,000 Years Ago Present Continents = 40,000,000 Years Ago

o Rivers/Streams – Carves, cuts, and transports sediment o Warm Periods

Neoproterozoic = 600,000,000 - 635,000,000 Years Ago Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum = 56,000,000 Years Ago

Ice

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________o Glaciation Periods

Quaternary = 2,580,000 – Present Ice Age = 18,000 Years Ago Created the fertile lands of the Midwest & the Great Lakes

Karoo = 360,000,000 – 260,000,000 Years Ago Andean-Saharan = 450,000,000 – 420,000,000 Years Ago Cryogenian = 720,000,000 – 635,000,000 Years Ago Huronian = 2,400,000,000 – 2,100,000,000 Years Ago

Physical Processeso Ice Wedging – expansion of water in crevices causes rock to break aparto Temperature Changes

Climate Areas – depends on what land forms is nearest the equator or the Poles

Chemical Processes o Acid Rain (Early Atmosphere)o Caves

What is the difference between erosion and weathering?

Weathering: breaking down of rocks, soil, and minerals Erosion: the transportation of sediment to other places via wind, gravity, water, or ice Weathering and erosion slowly chisel, polish, and buff Earth's rock into ever evolving

works of art—and then wash the remains into the sea. The processes are definitively independent, but not exclusive. Weathering is the

mechanical and chemical hammer that breaks down and sculpts the rocks. Erosion transports the fragments away.

Working together they create and reveal marvels of nature from tumbling boulders high in the mountains to sandstone arches in the parched desert to polished cliffs braced against violent seas.

Water is nature's most versatile tool. For example, take rain on a frigid day. The water pools in cracks and crevices. Then, at night, the temperature drops and the water expands as it turns to ice, splitting the rock like a sledgehammer to a wedge. The next day, under the beating sun, the ice melts and trickles the cracked fragments away.

Repeated swings in temperature can also weaken and eventually fragment rock, which expands when hot and shrinks when cold. Such pulsing slowly turns stones in the arid desert to sand. Likewise, constant cycles from wet to dry will crumble clay.

Bits of sand are picked up and carried off by the wind, which can then blast the sides of nearby rocks, buffing and polishing them smooth. On the seashore, the action of waves chips away at cliffs and rakes the fragments back and forth into fine sand.

Plants and animals also take a heavy toll on Earth's hardened minerals. Lichens and mosses can squeeze into cracks and crevices, where they take root. As they grow, so do the cracks, eventually splitting into bits and pieces. Critters big and small trample, crush, and plow rocks as they scurry across the surface and burrow underground. Plants and animals also produce acids that mix with rainwater, a combination that eats away at rocks.

Rainwater also mixes with chemicals as it falls from the sky, forming an acidic concoction that dissolves rock. For example, acid rain dissolves limestone to form karst, a type of terrain filled with fissures, underground streams, and caves like the cenotes of Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula.

Back up on the mountains, snow and ice buildup into glaciers that weigh on the rocks beneath and slowly push them downhill under the force of gravity. Together

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________with advancing ice, the rocks carve out a path as the glacier slumps down the mountain. When the glacier begins to melt, it deposits its cargo of soil and rock, transporting the rocky debris toward the sea. Every year, rivers deposit millions of tons of sediment into the oceans.

Without the erosive forces of water, wind, and ice, rock debris would simply pile up where it forms and obscure from view nature's weathered sculptures. Although erosion is a natural process, abusive land-use practices such

as deforestation and overgrazing can expedite erosion and strip the land of soils needed for food to grow.

Geologic Time Project – History & Development of Our Planet

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________Group 5: Development of Life

Directions: Add each event and sketch/color a small picture

to represent the event.

Important Events

Humans appear= 2,000,000 Years Ago

Large carnivores= 35,000,000 Years Ago

First flowering plants=130,000,000 Years Ago

First birds= 150,000,000 Years Ago

First mammals= 190,000,000 Years Ago

First dinosaurs= 225,000,000 Years Ago

First reptiles= 315,000,000 Years Ago

First insects = 363,000,000 Years Ago

First amphibians= 370,000,000 Years Ago

First land plants= 420,000,000 Years Ago

First vertebrates= 485,000,000 Years Ago

First fish= 510,000,000 Years Ago First multi-celled organism=

1,200,000,000 Years Ago First invertebrates (animals

without backbones) = 3,500,000,000 Years Ago

First single-celled organism= 3,500,000,000 Years Ago

Origin of Earth=4,600,000,000 Years Ago

Major Mass Extinctions

Ordovician-Silurian Extinction = 440,000,000 Years Agoo Small marine organisms died out

Devonian Extinction = 365,000,000 Years Agoo  Many tropical marine species went extinct

Permian-Triassic Extinction = 250,000,000 Years Agoo The largest mass extinction (95% of all species) event in Earth's history

affected a range of species, including many vertebrates Triassic-Jurassic Extinction = 210,000,000 Years Ago

o The extinction of other vertebrate species on land allowed dinosaurs to flourish Cretaceous-Tertiary Extinction (KT Boundary) = 65,500,000 Years Ago

o ¾ of the plant and animal species on Earth

Use this reading to help you create your timeline!

In the very beginning of earth's history, this planet was a giant, red hot, roiling, boiling sea of molten rock - a magma ocean. The heat had been generated by the repeated high speed collisions of much smaller bodies of space rocks that continually clumped together as they collided to form this planet. As the collisions tapered off the earth began to cool, forming a thin crust on its surface. As the cooling continued, water vapor began to escape and condense in the earth's early atmosphere. Clouds formed and storms raged, raining more and more water down on the primitive earth, cooling the surface further until it was flooded with water, forming the seas.

****Convert all numbers to centimeters by moving the decimal SEVEN places to the LEFT!!!

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________It is theorized that the true age of the earth is about 4.6 billion years old, formed at about the same time as the rest of our solar system. The oldest rocks geologists have been able to find are 3.9 billion years old. Using radiometric dating methods to determine the age of rocks means scientists have to rely on when the rock was initially formed (as in - when its internal minerals first cooled). In the infancy of our home planet the entire earth was molten rock - a magma ocean.

Since we can only measure as far back in time as we had solid rock on this planet, we are limited in how we can measure the real age of the earth. Due to the forces of plate tectonics, our planet is also a very dynamic one; new mountains forming, old ones wearing down, volcanoes melting and reshaping new crust. The continual changing and reshaping of the earth's surface that involves the melting down and reconstructing of old rock has pretty much eliminated most of the original rocks that came with earth when it was newly formed. So the age is a theoretical age.

When Did Life on Earth Begin? - Scientists are still trying to unravel one of the greatest mysteries of earth: When did "life" first appear and how did it happen? It is estimated that the first life forms on earth were primitive, one-celled creatures that appeared about 3 billion years ago. That's pretty much all there was for about the next two billion years. Then suddenly those single celled organisms began to evolve into multicellular organisms. Then an unprecedented profusion of life in incredibly complex forms began to fill the oceans. Some crawled from the seas and took residence on land, perhaps to escape predators in the ocean. A cascading chain of new and increasingly differentiated forms of life appeared all over the planet, only to be virtually annihilated by an unexplained mass extinction. It would be the first of several mass extinctions in Earth's history.

Scientists have been looking increasingly to space to explain these mass extinctions that have been happening almost like clockwork since the beginning of "living" time. Perhaps we've been getting periodically belted by more space rocks (ie. asteroids), or the collision of neutron stars happening too close for comfort? Each time a mass extinction occurred, life found a way to come back from the brink. Life has tenaciously clung to this small blue planet for the last three billion years. Scientists are finding new cues as to how life first began on earth in some really interesting places - the deep ocean.

Checking the Fossil Record - Scientists have studied rocks using radiometric dating methods to determine the age of earth. Another really cool thing they've found in rocks that tells us more about the story of earth's past are the remains of living creatures that have been embedded in the rocks for all time. We call these fossils. It has been the careful study of earth's fossil record that has revealed the exciting picture about the kinds of creatures that once roamed this planet. Fossilized skeletons of enormous creatures with huge claws and teeth, ancient ancestors of modern day species (such as sharks) that have remained virtually unchanged for millions of years, and prehistoric jungles lush with plant life, all point to a profusion of life and a variety of species that continues to populate the earth, even in the face of periodic mass extinctions.

By studying the fossil record scientists have determined that the earth has experienced very different climates in the past. In fact, general climactic conditions, as well as existing species, are used to define distinct geologic time periods in earth's history. For example, periodic warming of the earth - during

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods - created a profusion of plant and animal life that left behind generous organic materials from their decay. These layers of organic material built up over millions of years undisturbed. They were eventually covered by younger, overlying sediment and compressed, giving us fossil fuels such as coal, petroleum and natural gas.

Alternately, the earth's climate has also experienced periods of extremely cold weather for such prolonged periods that much of the surface was covered in thick sheets of ice. These periods of geologic time are called ice ages and the earth has had several in its history. Entire species of warmer-climate species died out during these time periods, giving rise to entirely new species of living things which could tolerate and survive in the extremely cold climate. Believe it or not, humans were around during the last ice age - the Holocene (about 11,500 years ago) - and we managed to survive. Creatures like the Woolly Mammoth - a distant relative of modern-day elephants - did not.

Geologic Time Project – History & Development of Our PlanetAnalysis Questions

1. How is time broken up geologically?

2. How has life evolved on the planet?

3. What characteristics are unique about our planet that is due to our early creation?

4. How did our planet get water?

5. What are the two main factors that have affected our atmosphere?

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________

6. How does the development of the Earth affect the type of soil an area has?

7. How have the landmasses changed since the beginning of time?

8. How has life influenced what our planet looks like?

9. How has life made/adapted our planet to its current state (so humans can survive)?

10.How has our planet changed through natural processes like weathering and erosion?

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________

Project Rubric0 2.5 3.5 4 5

Dates Plotted

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dates

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Explanations

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explanations

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Summary Info.

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could be better

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Creativity Did Not Turn

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Little to no color and pictures

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dates & scale are

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accurate to centimeters

Name(s): ________________________________________________________________

Total: /30 points