Triassic

High school (ages 12+)
History & Culture

Name:

Date:

Step 1 · Read the article

Open the article and read it at the level above. Then answer the questions below in your own words.

https://smallwhale.org/articles/triassic

Write what each word means, using the article.

Do not copy the article. Write two things you learned, the way you would explain them to a friend.

Answers below are taken from the article’s stored facts, so they match what the student read.

1. What is the geological epochs?Early Triassic, Middle Triassic, Late Triassic
2. What is the supercontinent configuration?Pangaea was largely intact, influencing global climate and biogeography
3. What happened during the Triassic period?The Triassic was a time after the biggest extinction, when Earth was healing, dinosaurs and early mammals began to appear, and the supercontinent Pangaea covered the planet.
4. Why were dinosaurs first seen in the Late Triassic?Dinosaurs first evolved from archosaurs, a group of reptiles, and the earliest known dinosaurs like Eoraptor and Herrerasaurus appeared in the Late Triassic, mainly in South America.

Archosaurs: A group of reptiles that includes crocodiles, dinosaurs, pterosaurs, and birds.
Crurotarsans: A diverse group of archosaurs that were dominant terrestrial predators during the Triassic, distinct from the dinosaur lineage.
Synapsids: A group of amniote vertebrates that includes mammals and their extinct relatives, distinct from sauropsids (reptiles and birds).