Natural Selection
Living things that are better suited to their environment survive and pass on their helpful features to their offspring.
Brief Introduction
Natural selection is like nature's way of picking winners and losers, similar to how we choose the best players for a sports team. 🌱 Over time, creatures that have features helping them survive (like being faster, stronger, or camouflaged) live longer and have more babies. These babies inherit these helpful features, making each generation better adapted to their environment.
Main Explanation
Variation 🎨
Just like how siblings look different from each other, members of the same species have different features. It's like having a bag of mixed candy - there are many varieties.
Competition 🥇
Not all living things can survive because there's limited food, water, and space. It's like musical chairs - not everyone gets a seat when the music stops.
Survival Advantage 💪
Some features help animals survive better than others. It's like having an umbrella in the rain while others get wet - you're better equipped for the conditions.
Inheritance 👶
Surviving creatures pass their helpful features to their babies. It's like a recipe being passed down in a family, but the recipe is for body features instead of food.
Examples
- Peppered moths: Light-colored moths were common until pollution made tree bark darker. Dark moths survived better because they were harder for birds to see, so they became more common. When pollution decreased, light moths became common again. 🦋
- Giraffes with longer necks could reach higher leaves during droughts, survived better, and had more babies. Over many generations, all giraffes ended up with long necks. 🦒
- Bacteria that survive antibiotics pass their resistance to offspring, creating 'superbugs' - just like how tough weeds in your garden survive weed killer and spread more tough weeds. 🦠