<p> Appendix A: Questions from the assessment</p><p>Question 1</p><p>A species of tiny bugs live in the grasslands in South America. Typically, bugs of this species live for about one year.</p><p>Male bugs can be grey, red or green. Red bugs are bright and easy to spot. Female bugs and predators easily notice these red bugs.</p><p>A scientist placed two identical groups of 100 male bugs in two different grasslands, A and B. The table below has information about how many male bugs of each color were placed in both grasslands. Grassland A had predatory insects that eat these bugs. Grassland B did not have any predators to eat these bugs. </p><p>Body color # of male bugs in # of male bugs in Grassland A Grassland B</p><p>Blue 33 33 Green 33 33 Red 34 34</p><p>After 70 years, this scientist went back to the two grasslands and counted the number of male bugs of each color. Here’s what she found: </p><p>Body # of male bugs in # of male bugs in color Grassland A Grassland B</p><p>Blue 8 9 Green 90 3 Red 2 88</p><p>Why do you think Grassland B (the one without predators) had mostly red male bugs after 70 years?</p><p>______</p><p>1 ______</p><p>The scientist decides to do the same experiment again in two different grasslands. She takes identical groups of 100 male bugs (shown in Table on page 1) and puts them in two different grasslands: Grassland C has predators, and Grassland D does not have predators. In the following questions, predict whether you think her results would be the same as before or different: </p><p>In Grassland D (without predators): </p><p>Would most of the bugs be red in color after 70 years? Why or why not? ______</p><p>For whichever color you think would be the most common this time, would there be 88 bugs of that color like in the previous experiment? Why or why not? ______</p><p>2 Question 2: Some species of snakes such as black snakes capture prey by opening their mouth as wide as they can to catch it. If a prey is bigger than how wide a snake can open its mouth, it won’t be able to capture the prey.</p><p>In 1930, a scientist collected data about the size of an adult snake’s head in a forest in Australia. Here’s what they found:</p><p>% snakes Size of its head 22% 1-2 inches 27% 2-3 inches 30% 3-4 inches 21% 4-5 inches In 1935, a species of toads called cane toads was released this forest. Cane toads are poisonous, and predators that eat them are very likely to die. In 2010, about 75 years after the cane toads were introduced to this forest, another group of scientists went back to this forest. Here’s what they found:</p><p>3 How do you think a scientist would explain why there were more snakes with small heads in this forest in 2010 than in 1930? Explain in as much detail as you can.</p><p>______</p><p>4 Question 3:</p><p>In 1935, scientists also collected information about little white spots on the legs of cane toads. They found that cane toads had 2, 3, 4 or 5 spots on each leg. Both legs had the same number of spots.</p><p>These spots did not in any way help or make it harder for a toad to survive. </p><p>This table shows how many toads had spots of each number in 1930:</p><p># of spots % of toads with these many spots 2 35% 3 20% 4 20% 5 25%</p><p>In 2011, if a scientist were to collect information about cane toads in this forest, would she still find toads with 2 spots, 3 spots, 4 spots, and 5 spots? Explain. ______</p><p>Fill this table to predict/guess approximately what percentage of toads with markings of each color there would be in 2011? (You don’t need to do any math here. Just predict approximately.)</p><p>No. of % of toads with these spots many spots 2 ______% 3 ______% 4 ______% 5 ______%</p><p>Please explain why you made this prediction.</p><p>______5</p>