Fossil sites are just a click away with Eastern Pacific Invertebrate Communities of the Cenozoic ("EPICC") Virtual Field Experiences. Presented by the University of California Museum of Paleontology, the project "provide[s] opportunities to virtually visit classic paleontological field sites along the Pacific coast and to explore images and data from specimens that have been collected there."...

Hosted by the Florida Museum of Natural History, this online database allows researchers and others to search the University of Florida Vertebrate Paleontology (UF) Collection. The UF Collection of 209,432 catalogued specimens contains "many unique (i.e. not found in other museums) fossil vertebrates from important sites spanning from the Eocene and Pleistocene epochs." The UF Collection features...

This website presents the Fossil Mammal Research Group whose "members are palaeontologists and archaeologists as well as palaeoenvironmental specialists in the School of Biological & Earth Sciences, Liverpool John Moores University, UK." Subjects of study by the Research group include mammalian fauna development over the past 30 million years, Plio-Pleistocene and Holocene climate change, and...

As part of Science Friday's Educator Collaborative series (check out the 10-13-2017 Scout Report), veteran science educator Marta Toran has created this lesson plan designed to engage middle school learners with the science of fossilization. In this hands-on, multi-day activity, students place chicken wings in plastic containers and observe how a variety of factors, such as air exposure and the...

The Courtenay and District Museum, which is physically located in British Columbia, Canada offers plenty of great online resources for paleontology enthusiasts around the world. The museum is a highly regarded and frequently visited hub for fossil sites and exhibitions; the Fossil and Dinosaurs section of their website replicates many of these great resources. Users new to paleontology study will...

From the National Park Service (previously featured in the 06-19-2020 Scout Report), this collection features more than 20 paleontology activities, lesson plans, and materials for elementary, middle, or high school classrooms. The resources were "developed by education specialists in the National Park Service, fossil sites, or museums across the country," which should assure science teachers that...

Intended as a public resource for scientists around the world, the Paleobiology Database "has been organized and operated by a multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional, international group of paleobiological researchers. Its purpose is to provide global, collection-based occurrence and taxonomic data for marine and terrestrial animal and plants of any geologic age, as well as Web-based software for...

Science teachers of middle and high school students may want to consider adding this creative lesson plan published by Science Friday to their curriculum. In this lesson, students take on the roles of both a paleontologist and a paleoartist to virtually examine dinosaur fossils, record their observations, and use those observations to create evidence-based visual interpretations of how their...

Produced by staff at the Illinois State Museum, this online exhibit offers a variety of interesting information and images for students and others interested in environments of the distant past. The site offers sections on Late Pleistocene Plants, Animals, Landscapes, and Extinctions. These broader sections include information on such topics as Spruce Pollen, Ground Sloths, Jaguars, Poplars, and...

Recently, a team of researchers in a remote area of eastern Utah led by Utah state paleontologist James I. Kirkland made an important discovery that has been described as a type of dinosaur “missing link”. Essentially, this “link” represents a rather primitive plant-eater that evolved from the meat-eating raptors that also gave rise to modern birds. The dinosaur has been named Falcarius utahensis,...