Students should be able to explain how organisms are adapted to live in…

The idea

An adaptation is a feature or behaviour that helps an organism survive and reproduce in its environment. Adaptations may be structural, such as a camel's hump storing fat or a polar bear's thick fur and small ears reducing heat loss; behavioural, such as migration or nocturnal activity; or functional, such as producing venom or conserving water. To explain an adaptation, name the feature, state the advantage it gives, and link that advantage to survival and reproduction in the named environment. For example, a deep root system lets a desert plant reach water, so it survives drought and can reproduce. Given information about an organism and its habitat, you should select relevant features and explain how each one improves the organism's chance of survival.

What earns the marks

• Identify a named adaptation of the organism, such as a structural, behavioural or functional feature.
• State the advantage the adaptation provides in the organism's natural environment.
• Explain how the advantage helps the organism survive, for example by obtaining food, avoiding predators or coping with physical conditions.
• Link survival to successful reproduction, so the adaptation becomes more common in the population over time.
• Use information provided in the question about the habitat or organism to justify why the adaptation is beneficial there.

Common mistakes and how to put them right

• Describing an adaptation without explaining its advantage.

  Put it right by adding a sentence that states how the feature helps the organism survive.

• Confusing adaptation with acclimatisation, such as a person getting a tan.

  Put it right by explaining that adaptations are inherited features that develop over generations.

• Giving a general advantage that could apply anywhere.

  Put it right by linking the adaptation specifically to the named environment and its conditions.

Exam tips

• Use the structure 'feature, so advantage, therefore survival and reproduction' to make your explanation clear.
• Name the type of adaptation, for example structural, behavioural or functional, when the question asks you to classify it.
• Refer to the specific habitat given in the question, such as 'the desert' or 'the Arctic', rather than writing about environments in general.
• If the question supplies information, use it directly in your answer instead of relying only on remembered examples.