Step 1 : Introduction to the question "1. "Koala bears" What is wrong with the phrase above?"
...1. The correct Australian spelling of "Koala" is "Koaaja" 2. Koalas are not bears 3. These animals do not exist 4. The name should never be pluralised Koalas are not from the Ursidae (bear) family of animals. They are, in fact, marsupials (like kangaroos, wallabies and possums), as they carry their young in a pouch. Slightly differently to most marsupials, however, a female koala's pouch opens downwards rather than upwards. The misconception is thought to have arisen from the fact that the first European settlers in Australia in the eighteenth century named newly discovered animals based on what they looked like to them. As such, some people called koalas "sloths" or "monkey bears" as well as just "bears".
