G103/203
Objectives Chapter 20
Paleozoic Earth
1) How many continents
were there at the beginning of the Paleozoic and which contained
2) What is an
3) Explain what a
transgression and a regression is and be able to
identify the rock sequence associated with them.
4) What is a Cratonic Sequence and why are they important to
understanding the geologic history of
5) How many Cratonic Sequences were there for
7) What is a
8) Know the three orogenies associated with the building of the
9) When did the
Ancestral Rocky Mountains form?
10) When did the coal
zones of
11) What was the
climate like, in general, at the end of the Paleozoic?
12) What is the
Cambrian explosion?
13) What is the Burgess
shale and why is it important to geologists?
14) What are some
possible explanations for the large mass extinction that occurred at the end of
the Paleozoic?
15) Know the following
important dates:
Ordovician: Appearance of Vertebrates in fossil record
Silurian: Plants move on to the land
Devonian: Age of the fish, Trees develop on land, First amphibians
Carboniferious (Miss &
Pen): First Reptiles
Permian: Radiation of Reptiles (replaces amphibians as major land animal)
203 Students:
16) Know each of the
major orogenies that occurred during the Paleozoic,
what type of plate tectonics they were associated with and where they occurred.
Paleozoic, what type of plate tectonics they were associated with and where they occurred.