Batrachia

High school (ages 12+)
Animals & Nature

Name:

Date:

Step 1 · Read the article

Open the article and read it at the level above. Then answer the questions below in your own words.

https://smallwhale.org/articles/batrachia

Write what each word means, using the article.

Do not copy the article. Write two things you learned, the way you would explain them to a friend.

Answers below are taken from the article’s stored facts, so they match what the student read.

1. What is the key derived trait?Ability to independently raise and lower eyeballs, a rare trait among vertebrates
2. What is the ecological indicator status?Amphibian populations serve as sensitive indicators of environmental health and pollution
3. Why are frogs and salamanders called a super-family?Frogs and salamanders are in the same super-family because they share many body parts and DNA that show they evolved from the same ancestor, more closely related to each other than to caecilians.
4. How can frogs and salamanders move their eyeballs?They can raise and lower their eyeballs by moving the muscles around the eye, which lets them look up or down without moving their heads. This helps them spot food and predators.

Clade: A group of organisms believed to have evolved from a common ancestor, forming a distinct branch on the tree of life.
Monophyly: The condition of being a taxonomic group that includes a single common ancestor and all of its descendants.
Sister Taxa: Two groups that are each other's closest relatives in a phylogenetic tree, sharing a common ancestor not shared by any other group.