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Reviewed by: Marissa Staller, 7th & 8th grade Science Teacher, LAUSD
Location: 5801 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90036, GPS Coordinates: (+34° 3' 51.79", -118° 21' 18.72")
Website: http://www.tarpits.org/
The Rancho La Brea Tar Pits (commonly referred shortened to the La Brea Tar Pits) are a cluster of tar pits in the urban heart of Los Angeles. In this area, tar (brea in Spanish) has been seeping up from the ground for tens of thousands of years. Often, the asphalt would form a deposit thick enough to trap animals, and the surface would be covered with layers of water, dust, and leaves. Animals would wander in to drink, become trapped, and die. Predators would also enter to eat the trapped animals and become stuck. The animals were then preserved as bones. The La Brea Tar Pits have become famous as one of the most famous fossil areas in the world.
Fossils of prehistoric species found at the La Brea Tar Pits include mammoths, dire wolves, short-faced bears, ground sloths, and saber-toothed cats. Only one human has ever been found, a partial skeleton of a woman who lived approximately 10,000 years ago. Other fossils, including fossilized insects and plants, and even pollen grains, are also valued. These fossils help define a picture of what is thought to have been a cooler, moister climate in the Los Angeles basin during the glacial age.
On site at the La Brea Tar Pits lies the George C. Page Museum, a museum and research station dedicated to researching the tar pits and displaying specimens from the animals that have died there. In addition to bone specimens, the museum contains short films describing the history of the area and the pits, an old animatronic sloth and sabertooth exhibit, an outdoor atrium, and an interactive "experience how difficult it is to pull something out of the tar" exhibit. One of the most interesting features at the museum, especially for students, is windows through which visitors can watch bones being cleaned and repaired.
Overall, the La Brea Tar Pits is a famous and easily accessible paleontological site because it is in a large city, with dramatic exhibits well presented at the George C. Page Museum.
The La Brea Tarpits and Page museum are currently managed by the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the research and preservation of Los Angeles's natural and cultural history.
Audience:
A life science teacher and class would benefit by a visit to the La Brea Tar Pits and Page Museum because the exhibits include excellent fossil specimens of species that once roamed Los Angeles, as well as interesting preservations of the food chain where predators got stuck chasing their prey into the tar pits.
An environmental science teacher and class would benefit by viewing actual examples fossils of extinct species and by viewing exhibits that help shed some light on speciation, predation, and extinction, as well as on climactic changes of the Southern California region.
Earth science teachers and classes would benefit from this field trip by gaining a better understanding of resources in California, like oil and tar, and their relation to California's geology.
An archaeology or paleontology class would benefit from seeing a real-life archaeological dig and investigation, and more advanced levels (such as high school or college) may be able to volunteer and get involved in the research.
NGSS Grades 7 & 8: Connection to Three Dimensional Learning & EEI Curriculum
Additional NGSS Instructional Segments Addressed
Seventh Grade:
Instructional Segment 2: Matter Cycles and Energy Flows through Organisms and Rocks
Instructional Segment 3: Natural Processes and Human Activities Shape Earth’s Resources and Ecosystems
Instructional Segment 3: Natural Processes and Human Activities Shape Earth’s Resources and Ecosystems
Eighth Grade:
Instructional Segment 3: Evolution Explains Life’s Unity and Diversity
Specific Ideas Addressed
Geology: Natural landscape of California and tar seepage.
Fossils: Incredible selection of fossils, recognized for having the largest and most diverse assemblage of extinct Ice Age plants and animals in the world
Ice Age: Exhibits that show how the world, particularly California, was during the last Ice Age (between 10,000 and 40,000 years ago)
Predation and the Food Chain: Interesting information and samples in the exhibits showing how predators followed their prey into the tar pits, becoming entrapped and dying as well.
Extinction: Exhibit’s remains of species such as the Saber-Toothed Cat and the Wooly Mammoth that are extinct and information related to their extinction.
Paleontology: Through windows at the Page Museum Laboratory, visitors can watch bones being cleaned and repaired by volunteers and paleontologists.
Next Generation Science Standards Addressed:
Earth Science
ESS1.C: The History of Planet Earth
ESS2.A Earth’s Materials and Systems
ESS3.A: Natural Resources
ESS3.C: Human Impacts on Earth Systems
Life Science
LS1.C: Organization for Matter and Energy Flow in Organisms
LS2.A: Interdependent Relationships in Ecosystems
LS2.B: Cycles of Matter and Energy Transfer in Ecosystems
Physical Science
PS1.A: Structure and Properties of Matter
PS3.A Definitions of Energy
PS3.D: Energy in Chemical Processes and Everyday Life
Engineering & Technology
ETS1.B: Developing Possible Solutions
Prior to or after field trip students will be able to....
construct a simple branching diagram to classify living groups of organisms by shared derived characteristics and how to expand the diagram to include fossil organisms.
explain that extinction of a species occurs when the environment changes and the adaptive characteristics of a species are insufficient for its survival.
describe how processes today are similar to those that occurred in the past and slow geologic processes have large cumulative effects over long periods of time.
describe how fossils provide evidence of how life and environmental conditions have changed.
La Brea Tar Pits Interactive Site Map
Student Tasks to Complete
Google Form on Vocabulary
Google Form Worksheet
For additional information:
Harris, J. M. and Jefferson, G.T. (eds.) 1985. Rancho La Brea: Treasures of the Tar Pits. Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County.
Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits
Rancho La Brea: A Look at Coastal Southern California's Past
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