Learners investigate how animals' physical features reveal what they eat and how they survive. Students examine teeth, beaks, claws, and body shapes as adaptations that match each animal's food source, classify animals as herbivores, carnivores, or omnivores, and practice reading natural features as clues about how animals live.

Key Ideas

• An adaptation is a physical feature or behavior that helps an organism survive and get what it needs.
• Animals' teeth, beaks, and claws are adaptations shaped by the food they eat. Flat teeth grind plants; sharp teeth tear meat.
• Herbivores eat only plants, carnivores eat only animals, and omnivores eat both. Each group has adaptations suited to its diet.
• Eye placement is also an adaptation. Predators tend to have eyes facing forward for depth perception; prey animals often have eyes on the sides for wider vision.
• The body features of an extinct animal, like a fossil, can reveal what it ate the same way a living animal's features can.

Vocabulary

• Adaptation: A physical feature or behavior that helps an organism survive and get energy.
• Herbivore: An animal that eats only plants.
• Carnivore: An animal that eats only other animals.
• Omnivore: An animal that eats both plants and animals.
• Predator: An animal that hunts and eats other animals.
• Prey: An animal that is hunted and eaten by a predator.

Discussion

• How can an animal's teeth give us clues about what it eats? What might flat teeth tell us compared with sharp teeth?
• Why do you think predators and prey often have their eyes in different positions? How does each arrangement help them survive?
• What is the difference between a herbivore, carnivore, and omnivore? What adaptations would you expect each one to have?
• If you discovered a fossil with very large, sharp teeth, what could you infer about the animal? What other evidence would you want before being sure?
• Pick an animal you know. What adaptations does it have that help it find, catch, or eat its food?