Who Wants to Live a Million Years?
Survival of the Fittest ~ Online Activity
Name:____________________________________________Date:_______________________Block:_______________
Introduction: In this interactive online game, you will carefully select traits of a species to provide
variation in your population. Over one million years, your population will experience hardships in various
forms – do you think you can select the right traits to survive? Only time will tell!
Directions:
1. Go to the class website
schwablhs.weebly.com
and click the
Resources
tab.
2. Click the Survival of the Fittest online game link.
3. Once on the website, click “Play Survival Game.”
4. Read Charles Darwin’s introduction to the game and click “proceed”.
5. Read the additional dialog and click “proceed”.
6. Your next task will be to choose the variations among the starter population of your species. Click
the textbook that reads “HINTS” in the bottom right of your screen to read through the pros/cons
of each variation. Fill in the chart below:
Thin
Long Neck
Pros: ______________________________
Pros: ______________________________
Cons: ______________________________
Cons: ______________________________
Bulky
Short Legs
Pros: ______________________________
Pros: ______________________________
Cons: ______________________________
Cons: ______________________________
Furry
Long Legs
Pros: ______________________________
Pros: ______________________________
Cons: ______________________________
Cons: ______________________________
Hairless
Stripes
Pros: ______________________________
Pros: ______________________________
Cons: ______________________________
Cons: ______________________________
7. Choose three variations among your species based on the pros/cons of each species. It may be hard
to pick three, but pick the three you believe to be best for the time being. Because genetics and
evolution are so awesome, you will have the chance to mutate your species later on. Using the table below,
write down the three variations you selected. (You will play the game 3 times, which is why there are 3 columns)
Game
1
Variations
2
3
1.
1.
1.
2.
2.
2.
3.
3.
3.
8. After choosing the three variations among your species, click “proceed” and begin the life of your
species. Your goal is to have your species survive the next one million years. Pay close attention to
the dialog boxes from Darwin – he’s there to help and he sure knows a thing or two about
evolution!
9. At least three events will happen in your species’ lifetime. These events can alter your population
in various ways. In the table below, record what events happened to your population. You will play
this game a total of three times, hoping to win one (if not all) three times. If your species dies
before the second or third event happens, please note that in the table.
Game
Events
1
2
3
1.
1.
1.
2.
2.
2.
3.
3.
3.
10. Play out the life of your species until you either win and your species survives or your species dies
as a result of the events occurring in the environment. You must complete the game three full
times. If you win, let your teacher know!
Questions:

In the game, you were given two life preservers that were able to introduce a genetic mutation
into your species. These mutations had the ability to help your species survive when an event
(temperature increase, predator, etc.) threatened the population. Explain how is this different from
how species survive in the real life? How is it similar? ______________________________________
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
Various events threatened your species throughout the duration of the game, a few of them Darwin
defined as “cataclysmic” events. Research the meaning of cataclysmic and define it below.
Additionally, identify two other cataclysmic events (aside from those that happened in your game)
that can jeopardize a species’ survival. ___________________________________________________
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
Over the duration of each game, did all three variations you selected in the beginning stay in the
population or did these variations disappear within the population? If variations selected in the
beginning did not appear in later generations of the species, explain why this may have happened.
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