• Quick retrieval from earlier learning (Variation within a group: read the data; Camouflage, warning colours and mimicry). Students answer on mini whiteboards.
• Show answers together and note who needs support in the main task.

1. Which survival trick is this: a harmless milk snake banded like a coral snake? (camouflage (blending in) / warning colours / mimicry (copying another animal)) → mimicry (copying another animal)Prompt: Is the animal hiding, showing off a warning, or pretending to be something else?
2. Which survival trick is this: a hoverfly striped like a wasp? (camouflage (blending in) / warning colours / mimicry (copying another animal)) → mimicry (copying another animal)Prompt: Is the animal hiding, showing off a warning, or pretending to be something else?
3. Which survival trick is this: a flatfish on the sandy sea floor? (camouflage (blending in) / warning colours / mimicry (copying another animal)) → camouflage (blending in)Prompt: Is the animal hiding, showing off a warning, or pretending to be something else?

• Show a microscope image of cells and ask what students think they are looking at.
• Share the objective: Evolution: how living things change over many generations. Read the success criteria together.

• Work through the example out loud, saying why you do each step, not just what you do.
• Example: On the Galápagos Islands, Charles Darwin noticed finches with different beak shapes on different islands. What did this suggest?
• Step 1: Finches with beaks suited to the local food survived and passed on that beak shape.
• Step 2: So the answer is: Each kind had adapted to the food on its island.
• Answer: Each kind had adapted to the food on its island.
• Pause after each step and ask a student to say what comes next.

• Do these together. Students try each step on whiteboards before you reveal it.
• Use the hints as prompts rather than giving the answer.

1. Giraffes have long necks. Which explanation fits evolution by natural selection? (Giraffes born with longer necks reached more food, survived and had more young. / Necks grow when giraffes sleep standing up. / Each giraffe stretched its neck and passed the stretch to its babies. / Giraffes decided to grow longer necks.) → Giraffes born with longer necks reached more food, survived and had more young.Prompt: Can a change from stretching be inherited?
2. True or false? All species that ever lived are still alive today. (True / False) → FalsePrompt: Variation, survival and inheritance over many generations.

• Students work on the student sheet. Circulate and check the first two answers of every student early.
• Students who finish: write a question of their own for a partner, with the answer.

The 6 questions are on the student sheet below, with answers in the key.

• Two questions on their own. Sort answers into got it / nearly / not yet to plan the next lesson.

1. True or false? Evolution happens to one animal during its life. (True / False) → FalsePrompt: Variation, survival and inheritance over many generations.
2. On the Galápagos Islands, Charles Darwin noticed finches with different beak shapes on different islands. What did this suggest? (All finches are identical. / The birds changed their beaks by choice. / Beaks are painted by the sun. / Each kind had adapted to the food on its island.) → Each kind had adapted to the food on its island.Prompt: Big seeds need strong beaks; insects need thin ones.

Free online practice with hints and printable worksheets for this skill: eurekami.com/science/grade-5.