Year 5 Science – Term 1 (WA Curriculum): Animal and Plant Adaptations for Survival

What this unit covers

In Term 1, Year 5 Science in the WA Curriculum centres on the unit “Animal and Plant Adaptations for Survival”.

Students explore how living things have developed structural and behavioural adaptations that enable their survival in different habitats including desert and ocean environments.

Lesson sequence (8 lessons)

The unit breaks down into the following lesson-by-lesson sequence — each title below is a teachable lesson, in order:

1. What are adaptations and why do living things need them?
2. Investigating structural adaptations in desert animals
3. Discovering behavioural adaptations of desert animals
4. Exploring how desert plants survive harsh conditions
5. Investigating ocean animal adaptations for survival
6. Discovering how ocean plants adapt to underwater life
7. Understanding camouflage as a survival adaptation
8. Comparing adaptations across different Australian habitats

Curriculum codes in this unit

Content codes:

Reading the codes: WA codes (the ones starting with WA) pack the year level, learning area, strand and content number into one string, while the national Australian Curriculum v9 uses a different anatomy that starts with AC9 — same content family, different labels. Our complete WA Curriculum guide decodes both, character by character.

Planning notes for Term 1

WA terms run roughly 9–11 weeks, and in 2026 Term 1 runs from Monday 2 February to Thursday 2 April — 9 weeks for WA public schools. With 8 lessons in this unit, that leaves breathing room for assessment, moderation and the weeks that disappear to carnivals, camps and public holidays — plan the assessable work to land two to three weeks before the end of term rather than in the final week.