Judy Massare

SUNY Brockport

The course is required for geology majors, who normally take it their sophomore or junior year. It is an elective for earth science majors, most of whom are pursuing secondary education certification. Earth science majors make up at least 50% of the class. Class size: 10-15

All students have taken Intro Physical Geology and Historical Geology. They can identify brachiopods from other marine invertebrates.
In my class, this is their first exposure to terms used to describe brachiopod morphology. The exercise would go faster if the students were already familar with the morphological terms from a lecture or reading assignments.

Stand alone exercise to accompany text material on describing fossils.

Learn morphology of brachiopods as an example of the kinds of terms used in species descriptions & diagnoses.
Interpret a written description of a fossil species.
Write a description of a fossil using appropriate terminology.

Experience the formality of fossil description that is the basis for data in paleontology.
Evaluate the relative importance of observations.

Develop observational skills.
Convey written descriptive information.

Students are given a description of a fossil brachiopod, from the literature, along with a one-page handout describing the basic morphology of brachiopods. Students work independently to make a scale drawing of the fossil described (brachial valve, pedicle valve, anterior view, lateral view). They have access to textbooks (Moore, Laliker & Fisher; Clarkson), the Treatise volume, and the internet to get information on morphological terms. This takes about an hour, after which I display all of the diagrams on the wall along with the photographs from the paper from which the description was extracted. We discuss some of the differences and where problems arose in interpreting the description. I emphasize the importance of an accurate drawing or photograph to accompany a description.

Students are then given a different brachiopod specimen and asked to produce a written description (pedicle-valve, brachial valve, anterior view, lateral view) of their fossil similar to the one that they read--i.e. using all of the appropriate terms. They are told that other students will be trying to match their description to their specimen. I collect all of the descriptions, edit them (remove portions that use incorrect terminology or inappropriate), and produce a handout of all of the descriptions.

At the next class, students are given the descriptions and asked to match descriptions to specimens. They do this independently outside of class. The specimens are made available in the lab room for several days. I add a couple of 'extra' specimens (without description) so that it is not a process of elimination.

At the next class meeting, students are given the descriptions written by the class. Students must match the descriptions to the fossils. Students are graded based on how many specimens they accurately identify AND on how many students accurately identify the specimen that they wrote about.