I am a Scientist

Palaeontologist

Created By QM Learning 2012

I am a Palaeontologist.

I study the fossils of animals and plants

and the places where they are found.

I look for clues about what life was like in

the past.

What do I do?

Hi. My name is Scott.

Where do I work?

I work outside at dig sites.

I work inside at the

Queensland Museum.

I talk about my work to adults and

young people.

Outside work

Firstly I identify a place that I think might have

fossils. I look at the soil and where the water has

been.

Outside work

We set up shade covers and get to work, carefully digging

the soil away.

Outside work

We use different types of tools. Can you think why?

Outside work

probing

brushing

scraping

sieving

Outside work

We measure the dig site and take photos to record the position of the fossils.

Outside work

We record everything we are taking away from

the site.

Outside work

Fossils are very easily broken. Sometimes we cover them

with plaster casts before moving them.

Back at the museum – Inside work

We sort the fossilsWe clean the fossils

Back at the museum – Inside work

We can learn a lot from fossils, such as:

• how big the animal was?

• how it moved?

• what type of food it ate?

• how it may have died?

We study fossils looking for clues.

The fossil below is an arm bone from an extinct kangaroo.

How do you think the animal may have died?

Back at the museum – Inside work

Then we try to identify the fossils. We ask a lot of questions. For this fossil we could ask:

All images in this slideshow © Queensland Museum, Marcel Bruyn and Rochelle Lawrence.

Is it like anything we have found before?

What type of bone is it?What animal group does it belong to?

What animal might it be?