# Founding and energy budget

**Audience:** Upper-secondary education, Biology and Physics. **Suggested time:** 40–45 min.
**Status:** technical draft; Biology and Physics teacher review pending.
**Starting lesson:** Two founding strategies (fundacao-coleta). Resources:
WebGL browser, paper or spreadsheet, and laboratory access. Follow the [common preparation](README.md).

## Objective

Compare founding strategies and discuss tradeoffs between reserves, outside
foraging and exposure without classifying one strategy as superior.

## BNCC

Proposed association: EM13CNT101, EM13CNT202, EM13CNT203, EM13CNT301 and EM13CNT302.
See the mapping and official source in the [general guide](README.md). Teacher review is needed.

## Steps and records

1. In 5 min, draw a food budget for an isolated queen and another that can forage.
   Identify one possible benefit and cost.
2. Open **Two founding strategies**. A is claustral; B semiclaustral. Both start
   with two alates and intact soil; there are no prepared workers.
3. Record profile, maternal reserves, founding stage and day-0 count. Resume until
   flight/landing is observed, or record that it has not yet happened.
4. Pause; advance five model days at a time, up to 30 if the budget permits.
   Record actual destination, stage, reserves, soil/foraging trips and brood.
   Do not add food or rain to only one side; lesson interventions are shared.
5. Discuss tradeoffs and what is missing to test real survival. Save stage records,
   including failures, and restore the backup.

## Discussion questions

- Does no outside foraging mean no energy expenditure?
- Does equal observation time imply equal biological stage?
- Can every final difference be attributed exclusively to foraging?

## Annotated answer guidance

Founding uses reserves and work even without outside food. Stages can occur on
different days and not every run succeeds. Profiles change foraging, entrance
and sealing; the pair compares strategies, not a single independent variable.
It demonstrates neither natural superiority nor interspecies differences.
Recognizing that founding did not occur is a valid result.

## What the model does not represent

Reserves, costs, flight and reproduction are demonstrations. Predators are removed
equally in this experiment, so it does not measure the full risk of leaving the
nest. This is not a comparison of real species.

## Learning evidence

Submit a hypothesis, comparable records with days/units, a data-supported
conclusion and one limitation. Use the general guide’s rubric; there is no
required outcome.

## Teacher review

Pending. No teacher or class was consulted to approve this guide. Record review
and adjustments in the appropriate form before treating it as validated.