Deep-Sea Survival
Explain how deep-sea animals cope with crushing pressure (no gas-filled spaces, flexible proteins, pressure-adapted enzymes); describe thermoregulation extremes — antifreeze glycoproteins in Antarctic fish, supercooling in wood frogs; introduce tardigrades and cryptobiosis (surviving desiccation, extreme temperatures, radiation, vacuum); survey other extremophiles (thermophiles at hydrothermal vents, halophiles in salt flats); consider what these organisms tell us about the limits of life
Try this together
Can your child describe an animal that can survive being frozen solid, completely dried out, or exposed to the vacuum of space — and explain roughly how it manages to survive conditions that would kill almost any other living thing?
Where this sits on the map
Stuck here? Check the skills it builds on first. Confident? Here’s what it unlocks.
solid = must come firstdashed = helps
Curriculum alignment
Candidate matches to official curriculum codes — machine-suggested, unreviewed (v0.1).
This skill sits beyond Year 6 in the Australian Curriculum, so no F–6 code is matched. It also sits beyond the NSW K–6 syllabuses. It also sits beyond Level 6 in the Victorian Curriculum.