Seasons & Organisms
What are seasons?
Different times of the year with different environmental conditions.
What is a producer?
A living thing that makes its own food.
What does a food chain show?
How energy moves from one organism to another.
What is an ecosystem?
A place where living and nonliving parts interact.
What is data?
Information collected during an investigation.
How can seasonal conditions affect living things?
They can affect how organisms behave, grow, find food, or survive.
What is a consumer?
A living thing that gets energy by eating other organisms.
What is usually the first living part of a food chain?
A producer.
What is habitat?
The place where an organism lives and gets what it needs to survive.
Why do scientists collect data?
To look for patterns and use evidence to answer questions.
What is one environmental condition that changes with the seasons?
Temperature
What is the main source of energy for the food chains you studied?
The Sun.
Which way does energy move in a food chain?
From the organism being eaten to the organism that eats it.
What can happen when habitat is lost?
Organisms may have less food, shelter, or space, and their populations may decrease.
If you record how many times students recycle each week, what are you collecting?
Data.
Why might an animal in a warm climate behave differently from the same type of animal in a colder climate?
Different temperatures and seasonal conditions can affect its survival needs and behavior.
How do animals get the energy they need?
By eating food—plants, animals, or both.
If a rabbit eats grass and a hawk eats the rabbit, which is the producer?
Grass.
How can a new predator affect an ecosystem?
It can decrease the populations of organisms it eats and change relationships in the ecosystem.
What does it mean if two populations both decrease as a resource decreases?
The data show a pattern or relationship between the changes.
When comparing two places, why is climate important when studying plants and animals?
Climate affects the conditions organisms experience and how they survive.
Why are producers important in an ecosystem?
They make food and store energy that can be passed to consumers.
Why does the Sun matter to a food chain?
It provides the energy that producers use to make food.
Why can a change to one population affect other populations?
Organisms depend on one another for food and other resources, so a change can affect the food web/chain.
What should a scientific explanation be based on?
Evidence collected from observations, measurements, or data.