--- title: Frogs, toads, newts and salamanders — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Frogs, toads, newts and salamanders», a lesson of the biology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: Frogs, toads, newts and salamanders are amphibians, which means «double life»: most start life in water and later live partly on land. --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / Frogs, toads, newts and salamanders # Frogs, toads, newts and salamanders Lesson 32 of the biology course of Mova's primary school: 17 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/0/) — Frogs, toads, newts and salamanders are amphibians, which means «double life»: most start life in water and later live partly on land. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/1/) — Look at a clump of frogspawn in a garden pond in March: each black dot is an egg in a ball of jelly, and in a few months it becomes a tadpole with gills, then grows back legs, front legs, and soaks its tail back into its body. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/2/) — Amphibian skin is thin and wet; frogs breathe partly through it and even drink through it, so they must stay damp and are hurt fast by dirty water. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/3/) — Some are record breakers: a wood frog freezes solid in the Alaskan winter and hops away in spring, and a Goliath frog from Cameroon is as big as a cat. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/4/) — Many old stories about them are wrong: toads do not give you warts, and salamanders are not born in fire, they just ran out of damp logs thrown on the fire. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/5/) — A common frog lays about 1,000 to 2,000 eggs in one clump of frogspawn, while toads lay their eggs in long strings round water plants; most eggs and tadpoles are eaten, so only a handful grow up, and adult frogs hunt on land and come back to the pond to breed. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/6/) — Tadpoles breathe with gills; during metamorphosis they grow back legs, then front legs, form lungs, and the body breaks down the tail and uses it as food. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/7/) — Frogs breathe partly through their thin, moist skin and drink through their skin, so they need damp places and are harmed quickly by pollution. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/8/) — Toads have dry, warty skin and short legs for walking; on wet spring nights they walk back to the pond where they hatched, and toad patrols carry them across roads. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/9/) — Touching a toad does not give you warts, which are caused by a human virus, but toads have a bitter poison behind their eyes, so wash your hands. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/10/) — A frog swallows prey whole and pulls its eyeballs down into its head to help push the food down its throat. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/11/) — Poison dart frogs warn enemies with bright colours; they get their poison from ants and mites they eat in the wild, so zoo frogs fed on fruit flies are not poisonous. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/12/) — Newts are amphibians with tails; in spring the male great crested newt grows a tall wavy crest, and newts can regrow lost legs and tails. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/13/) — The axolotl is a salamander that keeps its feathery baby gills and stays in water all its life; wild axolotls live only in a few canals near Mexico City and are critically endangered. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/15/) — The wood frog lets about two thirds of the water in its body freeze; its heart stops, and sugar works as antifreeze inside its cells until it thaws in spring; doctors study it to learn how to keep organs for transplant, body parts given to sick people, cold for longer. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/16/) — Male frogs call to rivals and females, often blowing up a vocal sac that makes the sound louder, like the body of a guitar. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/32-frogs-toads-newts-and-salamanders/17/) — The Goliath frog of West Africa can be about 32 cm long and weigh over 3 kg, while the smallest frogs are under 8 mm long. - ← previous: [Turtles and tortoises](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/31-turtles-and-tortoises/) - next →: [Birds: feathers, wings, eggs and flight](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/33-birds-feathers-wings-eggs-and-flight/) - ↑ back to [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/)