• [History of life: Grades 6-8] Through billions of years of evolution, life forms have continued to diversify in a branching pattern, from single-celled ancestors to the diversity of life on Earth today.
• [Studying evolution: Grades 6-8] Scientists use fossils to learn about past life. (LS4.A, ESS1.C)

• Disciplinary Core Idea LS4.A: Evidence of Common Ancestry and Diversity
• Disciplinary Core Idea ESS1.C: The History of Planet Earth

We recommend preceding this activity with "Sequencing Time" - an activity in which students assign relative and numerical times to events in their lives to understand how scientists developed the Geologic Time Scale.

• Geologic Time
• History of Life