Evolution

Pre-K-2
Students describe similarities and differences between present day and past organisms that helped the organisms live in their environment.

a. Describe some organisms’ features that allow the organisms to live in places others cannot. b. Explain how some kinds of organisms that once lived on Earth have completely disappeared, although they were similar to some that are alive today.

3-5
Students describe the fossil evidence and present explanations that help us understand why there are differences among and between present and past organisms.

a. Explain advantages and disadvantages gained when some individuals of the same kind are different in their characteristics and behavior. b. Compare fossils to one another and to living organisms according to their similarities and differences.

6-8
Students describe the evidence that evolution occurs over many generations, allowing species to acquire many of their unique characteristics or adaptations.

a. Explain how the layers of sedimentary rock and their contained fossils provide evidence for the long history of Earth and for the long history of changing life. b. Describe how small differences between parents and offspring can lead to descendants who are very different from their ancestors. c. Describe how variations in the behavior and traits of an offspring may permit some of them to survive a changing environment. d. Explain that new varieties of cultivated plants and domestic animals can be developed through genetic modification and describe the impacts of the new varieties of plants and animals.

9-Diploma
Students describe the interactions between and among species, populations, and environments that lead to natural selection and evolution.

a. Describe the premise of biological evolution, citing evidence from the fossil record and evidence based on the observation of similarities within the diversity of existing organisms. b. Describe the origins of life and how the concept of natural selection provides a mechanism for evolution that can be advantageous or disadvantageous to the next generation. c. Explain why some organisms may have characteristics that have no apparent survival or reproduction advantage. d. Relate structural and behavioral adaptations of an organism to its survival in the environment.