Monday, August 29, 2011

Monica: Social Studies Homework #2

                               Lesson Review    
1.      Why is Olduvai Gorge so important in the study of human origins?
Because Olduvai Gorge is the place where the earliest human ancestors lived.
   
2.      Use each of the following vocabulary words in a paragraph about the Leakeys’ work at Olduvai Gorge.
archaeology        fossil
excavate             theory
            Louis, as an archaeologist, carefully excavate, historical sites, pottery, and fossils, with his with his wife, Mary Leaky. They were looking proves that Leakey’s theory that the Olduvai Gorge region was where our earliest ancestors originated.
     
3.      Why is it important to know about our human ancestors?
So you know where we come from and it makes you who you are today.
   
4.      Why is Olduvai Gorge sometimes referred to as the “ Cradle of Humankind”
Because in Olduvai Gorge was the place were the ancestors lived.                 

Monica: Social Studies Homework


 
                                The Cradle of Humankind
                                        Olduvai Gorge
             Long time ago one part of Earth’s crust split leaving a depression or a low area. The Great Rift Valley is an example of a depression that runs for more than 3,000 miles from the nation of Syria in Southwest Asia to Mozambique in East Africa. The Great Rift Valley appears to be in Tanzania in East Africa. North of Tanzania is Olduvai Gorge. Olduvai Gorge is a steep-sided ravine that is 300 feet deep and 30 miles long. Millions of years ago, Olduvai Gorge was an area of heavily forested that had water and a huge amount of animals including sheep, antelope, elephants, and ostriches. Also it remained earliest human ancestors. But now Olduvai Gorge is like a desert that only a few of people live there.
                        Archaeologists Louis and Mary Leakey
                 Louis Leakey was the one who discovered the remains of the human ancestors. When he was only a 12-year-old boy in Kenya, in East Africa, he found his first fossil. A fossil is the trace or imprint of ancient life that has been preserved in Earth’s crust. After Leakey found the fossil he decided to be an archaeologist. Archaeology is the study of the remains of past cultures. Archaeologists dig or excavate carefully historical sites, looking for tools, buildings, and fossils. They called it ‘digs’. In meantime almost his whole family worked with him.
                                                A Human Ancestor
               The Leakeys were interested in early people.  They would ask their selves: What did they look like? Where did they live? How long did they live there? What was their daily live?
                                                Looking Backward 
                  Some digs of archaeologists can take years and not finding what they were looking for. Richard Leakey, Louis Leakey’s son, explained why this was true: “To me it’s a question of being able to look backward and give the present a root….To give meaning to where we are today, we need to look at where we have come from.” In the 1930s Louis went to Olduvai Gorge to work there. He thought that this was were the early people lived. But most of the scientists would not agreed with him. Afterwards, it was generally believed that the earliest ancestors lived in Asia, not in Africa.
                                    Discovery of Early Humans
                   Louis Leaky and his wife Mary Leaky worked for 20 years together in Olduvai Gorge. They did not found important things. But they did found skeletons of animals, fossils, and early tools. None of these prove Leakey’s theory that the early people lived in the Olduvai Gorge. A theory is an idea that needs to be tested against the best available evidence or facts.  In 1959, Louis got sick so Mary went to search by herself. She went to dig were they started at first when something caught her eye. Carefully she excavated and saw hundreds of bones. When the bones were reassembled, they formed a complete skull of an early human ancestor.
                                                 Nutcracker Man  
                                    Mary named her Nutcracker Man because of his square teeth. She thought because he probably used his teeth to crush the nuts and the roots. These were the foods that grew in the areas where the African grassland, or savannas, met the forest. The area was where the first ancestors lived. The scientific name for the Nutcracker Man is Australopithecus.
                                              Testing the Evidence
                                    Meanwhile Louis Leakey thought that Nutcracker Man lived for 600,000 years ago. Tests measured and new tests, using the latest scientific methods and chemistry, scientists from the University of California were able to examine fossils as well as rocks and soil where the Nutcracker Man was found. The Leakeys were shocked what they discovered.
                                               Older than We Knew
                           The tests prove that the skull of Australopithecus was 1.7 to 2 million years old. The discovery of the Leakeys made East Africa and Olduvai Gorge an important site of the study of human. Soon many people referred to Olduvai Gorge by the name one scientist used: the “Cradle of Humankind.”