Close-up of a kākā, a native New Zealand parrot

World 05 · Any term · Combined Year 7–8 class

Evolution & Adaptation

How do populations change over time?

Your mission

Survivors: how do populations change?

What you'll make

An explanation of why a species like the moa disappeared, and a verdict on whether an earlier claim about variation still holds.

Who it's for

Your class and a conservation group

How long

About nine one-hour sessions, in any term. It can be shorter or longer.

NZ curriculum, Years 7–8:Science: Organism Diversity· Topics: evolution, natural selection, adaptation, fossils, extinction, moa, kākā, kea and kākāpō, variation

Your journey

Nine weeks from question to something you're proud of

Each week has one job. You ask, investigate, make sense of it, design, build, test, improve and share.

Nine weeks, one hour each

Tap a week to see that lesson. Each world runs as nine one-hour weeks; it can be shortened to five weeks or stretched to 11–12.

5 weeks

Quick build

A paper-moth selection model, a graph and an explanation of natural selection.

9 weeks

Full journey

Read fossils, test a selection model under a new condition, retest a MaramaTrap claim and explain an extinction.

11–12 weeks

Go further

A digital selection model in Scratch, a kākāpō conservation brief, or sharing with a conservation group.

Big ideas

What this world is really about

Big idea 1
Fossils and other evidence show that organisms have changed over Earth's history.
Big idea 2
Heritable variation, combined with selection pressures, drives change in populations over generations.
Big idea 3
Evolution describes change in populations over generations, not within individuals.

Up close

Things you'll meet in this world

A kākā up close. Compare its beak with a kea's and a kākāpō's.
Photo: Judi Lapsley Miller, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Two North Island kākā preening each other.
Photo: Judi Lapsley Miller, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Read first

Background reading

Short readings to read with a partner. Stop at each “Think about it” and talk it through.

A land of birdsRead

New Zealand was separated from other land for about 80 million years. Many groups of animals that live elsewhere never arrived: no land mammals except bats, no snakes. So birds took on many roles, and many species evolved here that are found nowhere else (they are endemic).

The top predators were birds too. Haast's eagle was huge (females 10–15 kg) and could kill moa weighing up to about 40 kg. Other hunters included a large harrier (Eyles's harrier) and the laughing owl.

Think about it: If the only predators hunt by sight from the air, what features would help a ground bird survive?

Source: Massey lecture "The arrival and impact of Homo sapiens in Aotearoa New Zealand" (M. Anderson).

The predator game changesRead

For millions of years, many New Zealand birds (kākāpō, takahē, kiwi, whio and others) survived eagle attacks with camouflage and by freezing still. If the eagle couldn't see movement, it couldn't find them. That was an adaptation that worked.

Then, in the last 2,000 years, mammal predators arrived: rats, and later stoats, ferrets, cats and others. These hunt by smell and sound as well as sight. Freezing doesn't help if a stoat can smell you. An adaptation that worked for millions of years suddenly failed.

Think about it: Is an adaptation "good" forever? Explain using the freezing example.

Source: Massey lecture "The arrival and impact of Homo sapiens in Aotearoa New Zealand".

Back from the brinkRead

Conservation in Aotearoa uses three kinds of action: protecting the habitat that is left (about 30% of the land is now in reserves, but more than 90% of wetlands are gone), managing endangered species, and restoring places through pest control, replanting and moving species back.

Islands have been vital. There are 337 islands bigger than 5 hectares, and many are safe from predators. Moving animals to a safe place is called translocation. Around 1900, conservation ranger Richard Henry moved kiwi and kākāpō to Resolution Island in Fiordland. More recently, the North Island saddleback went from a single island population of about 500 birds in the early 1900s to 15 island populations and 3 mainland populations by 2013. The Chatham Island black robin and the takahē are other species brought back from the brink.

Think about it: Every saddleback today comes from one small island population. How might that affect the variation in the species? (This is a question to investigate, not an answer.)

Source: Massey lecture "Back from the brink in Aotearoa New Zealand".

One more reading draws on mātauranga Māori and will appear once our cultural advisor has checked it.

Go deeper: from Science Learning Hub and DOC

How our birds are built for their worldRead

An adaptation is a feature that helps a living thing survive and reproduce where it lives. There are three kinds:

Kind	What it means	Native bird examples
Structural	Body parts	Kiwi have nostrils at the tip of the beak for sniffing out food, and whiskers for feeling in the dark. Tūī have a long curved beak and a brush-tipped tongue for nectar. Kererū have the widest mouths of our forest birds, so they can swallow and spread big seeds
Behavioural	Things they do	Kiwi are active at night. Kākāpō breed in years when rimu trees produce lots of fruit
Physiological	How their bodies work inside	Kererū parents make “crop milk”, a protein-rich food for their chicks

With no ground-hunting mammals for tens of millions of years, some birds, such as kiwi and takahē, lost the need to fly. Their wings became small and their bodies large.

When people arrived, bringing predators and clearing forest, many of these adaptations stopped protecting them.

Think about it: Pick one adaptation from the table. In what kind of world is it a strength, and in what kind of world does it become a weakness?

Adapted for Kōkiri Lab from “Native bird adaptations”. Source: Science Learning Hub – Pokapū Akoranga Pūtaiao, The University of Waikato Te Whare Wānanga o Waikato, www.sciencelearn.org.nz Read the original

Explore more

Trusted places to find out more

Videos, articles and activities from Science Learning Hub and other trusted sites, matched to the week they help most.

These links open other websites. Kōkiri Lab checked them in September 2026.

How you'll learn

Investigate, think, make, share

Every world moves through the same four areas. Pick one to see what you actually do here.

What evidence can we gather?

Students encounter the phenomenon, build the knowledge needed to interpret it, and gather evidence directly.

What you actually do in this world

Analyse evidence from evolutionary contexts (fossil records, trait variation, environmental change) to see how a scientific explanation develops over time.

This is not a strict pipeline. A student may investigate, model, test, investigate again, revise, and communicate, in whatever order the actual inquiry demands.

Make something

Investigate it. Build it.

Hands-on science investigations and build projects for this world, each linked to the week it fits. Open one to see what you need and how to do it.

Science investigations

VOICE: ask a question and find out with evidence

Paper moth huntDoes camouflage help a moth survive?Open

You need

paper 'moths' in two colours · patterned background · timer

Steps

Scatter equal numbers of each colour on the background.
'Predators' have 15 seconds to pick up moths.
Survivors 'breed': add one more of each survivor's colour.
Repeat for 3 generations.

How you'll know: Graph each colour over time. The better-camouflaged colour should increase.

Go further: Change the background. Does the winner change?

Fits Week 4 →

Measure the differenceHow much do individuals of one kind vary?Open

You need

20+ leaves or shells · ruler or callipers

Steps

Measure the same feature on every one.
Graph how many are each size.
Discuss: which differences could be passed on?

How you'll know: Your graph shows the spread. Most are near the middle, with a few at each end.

Go further: Compare two different trees or beaches.

Fits Week 3 →

Beak matchWhich beak suits which food?Open

You need

tools as 'beaks' (tweezers, pegs, spoons) · foods (seeds, water in a tube, rice)

Steps

Each tool gets 30 seconds on each food.
Count how much it collects.
Match each tool to a real NZ bird beak (tūī, kākā, kiwi).

How you'll know: You can explain why a beak shape suits a food, using your results.

Go further: Invent a bird for a new food, and draw its beak.

Fits Week 7 →

Build projects

FORGE: design, make, test and improve

Survival gameCan we design a game that shows natural selection working?Open

You need

card or Scratch

Steps

Choose a creature, a feature that varies and a predator.
Write the rules: who survives, how offspring inherit.
Play 5 rounds and record what happens.

How you'll know: Players can see the population change over rounds.

Go further: Build it as a digital model in Scratch.

Fits Week 6 →

Extinction explainerCan we explain why a species disappeared, using evidence?Open

You need

evidence cards or readings · poster or slides

Steps

Sort the evidence into causes.
Decide which causes mattered most, and why.
Present it with one piece of evidence per cause.

How you'll know: Each claim on your explainer points to evidence.

Go further: Connect it to a species at risk today.

Fits Week 8 →

Family treeHow closely related are kākā, kea and kākāpō?Open

You need

trait cards · paper

Steps

List shared traits in a table.
Group the two most similar first.
Draw a simple family tree.

How you'll know: Your tree matches your trait table, and you can say what evidence would change it.

Go further: Add a fourth bird and place it.

Fits Week 7 →

More ideas from the Kōkiri library

Background learning

Earlier Kōkiri inquiries with learn pages, activities and build ideas that fit this world. They were written before the eight-world curriculum, so use them as background and pick what helps.

Makerspace build ideas

Ready-made ideas from the Kōkiri maker library that suit the Make & Test part of this world.

Stretch challenges

Design a background where a new colour wins.
Explain why individuals don't evolve, but populations do.
Compare two ways of reading a fossil and defend one.

Where AI helps

AI is your thinking partner, not your ghost-writer

AI turns up at particular moments in this world, to help you think harder. The ideas, the making and the explaining stay yours.

Kōkako, your AI mentor
Weeks 5 and 8
What it does
Asks you one question at a time, such as “What else could explain it?”. It never tells you the answer or whether you are right.
What you do
Weigh the evidence and choose the explanation you can defend.

Our AI promise

AI asks. You decide.
AI never writes your explanation or does your making for you.
AI never gives you a mark or a score.
If AI is unsure, it says so, and that is useful evidence too.

Students recording moths on a lit white sheet at night

Your platform

MaramaTrap data, revisited

No new platform: the Biodiversity & Discovery MaramaTrap data is revisited as longitudinal evidence.

The open light-trap upload is live. The same dataset is revisited later as longitudinal evidence in Evolution & Adaptation.

Open MaramaTrap

For teachers: curriculum, reasoning and inquiry stages

Essential knowledge

Taught to the whole combined class. Over the two-year programme the class covers both the Year 7 and Year 8 curriculum statements.

Organism DiversityFossil evidence, heritable variation, selection pressures, natural selection, common ancestry, extinction.
Phase 3 curriculumThe local biodiversity dataset from Biodiversity & Discovery, revisited as longitudinal evidence for population comparison.

The whole combined Year 7–8 class investigates the same phenomenon, with the same fieldwork, equipment and inquiry problem. Instead of splitting the class by year level, every task has three levels of support (Getting started, On track, Stretch), so each learner goes as deep as they are ready to.

Dominant mode:

Investigate
Model

Reasoning this world makes visible

Comparing populations, traits and conditions across time is the central intellectual move this world asks students to make.

Comparative reasoning

Starting out: Identify similarities and differences.
Going further: Compare explanations or models and justify which better accounts for the evidence.

All five dimensions recur across every world. Each world provides a context in which one or more becomes especially visible, not an exclusive assignment.

VOICE and FORGE stages

Document 33 stage names, used across Kōkiri. The week plan above shows which stages each week works in.

Te reo groupings shown are provisional, pending cultural advisor review.

VOICE: investigating

Mainly in STEM Investigate and Think & Create.

Kite · te reo group (provisional)

Question · What do we want to find out, and why does it matter?
Observe · What do we notice?
Evidence · What did we actually record?

Whakaaro · te reo group (provisional)

Compare · What is the same or different?
Interpret · What might the evidence mean?
Uncertainty · How sure are we, and why?
Finding · What can we say?
Next step · What should happen next?

FORGE: designing and making

Mainly in Make & Test, ending with Explain in Share & Impact.

Wero · te reo group (provisional)

Frame · What is the problem, who is it for, and what counts as success?

Kite · te reo group (provisional)

Options · What are at least two real ways we could do it?

Whakaaro · te reo group (provisional)

Represent · Can we sketch, flowchart or model it before we build?

Auaha · te reo group (provisional)

Generate · Make it.

Tohu · te reo group (provisional)

Test · Does it work? Record what actually happened.
Evaluate · How well does it meet the criteria, and why?
Refine · What one change will help, and why?
Explain · How do we explain it, and the evidence, to someone else?

Aotearoa and place

Moa, tuatara, kākāpō, kea, and the history of introduced species in Aotearoa, following the curriculum's own example set.