Inheritance Vocabulary
Use vocabulary for variation and inheritance — inherited characteristic, acquired characteristic, variation, offspring, trait, species, breed, genetic, environment — and apply these when comparing organisms and explaining similarities and differences within and between species
What a learner can do afterwards
- Distinguish between inherited and acquired characteristics with a correct example of each
- Use 'variation' correctly to describe differences within a species and explain what causes variation
- Use 'offspring', 'species', and 'trait' correctly in written descriptions of living things
The lesson
Every living thing has traits. A trait is any feature, like eye color, leaf shape, or ear size. Some traits are inherited characteristics. That means you get them from your parents, and you have them from before you were even born.
Other traits are acquired characteristics. You pick these up from things that happen to you while you are alive, not from your parents. A scar from a fall, a suntan, or a new skill you practiced are all acquired characteristics.
Look at a litter of puppies. They are the offspring of the same two dogs, and every puppy belongs to the same species, dog. But look closer: one puppy has floppy ears, another has pointy ears. One is brown, another is black and white. These small differences within the same species are called variation.
A breed, like Labrador or Poodle, is a group within a species that shares certain inherited traits. Those traits pass down through genetic information from parents. The environment where a living thing grows up can shape its acquired characteristics too.
Inherited traits pass down through genes from parents, acquired traits come from life experience, and variation is the differences you see among offspring of the same species.
Watch it
Where it sits
Learn first
Nothing; this is a starting point.
Where this leads
Jobs that lean on this skill. Follow one to see everything it is built on.
8 questions wait behind this lesson, each with its answer explained. Every answer feeds the sky: stars light as they are learned, and dim when it is time to come back.