Life Science: Biology · Natural Selection and Evolution

HS-LS4-3Advantageous Heritable Traits

Performance expectation

Apply concepts of statistics and probability to support explanations that organisms with an advantageous heritable trait tend to increase in proportion to organisms lacking this trait.

What NYSED says about assessing it

Clarification statement

Emphasis is on analyzing shifts in numerical distribution of traits and using these shifts as evidence to support explanations.

Assessment boundary

Assessment is limited to basic statistical and graphical analysis. Assessment does not include allele frequency calculations.

The three dimensions

Every item written to HS-LS4-3 has to assess all three dimensions together, not the content alone. This is the structural change that made older practice material stop matching the exam.

Science & engineering practice

Analyzing and Interpreting Data

Disciplinary core ideas
  • LS4.B: Natural Selection
  • LS4.C: Adaptation
Crosscutting concepts
  • Patterns

Related performance expectations

Generate a cluster for HS-LS4-3

Phenomenon stimulus, connected items across the required types, answer key, rubric and figures drawn deterministically from a structured spec — in the format your students will sit.