Life Cycles
This process in plants uses sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide to make food.
What is photosynthesis?
Water changing from a liquid to a solid is an example of this type of change.
What is a physical change?
This sphere of Earth includes all the water.
What is the hydrosphere?
This force pulls objects towards each other.
What is gravity?
This tool is used to separate a mixture of sand and water.
What is a filter or filtration?
An animal that eats only plants is called this.
What is a herbivore?
A combination of two or more substances where each substance keeps its own properties is called this.
What is a mixture?
The continuous movement of water on, above, and below the surface of the Earth is called this.
What is the water cycle?
Energy of motion is called this.
What is kinetic energy?
What is the main source of energy for most ecosystems on Earth?
What is the sun?
In a food chain, these organisms break down dead plants and animals.
What are decomposers?
Heating sugar until it turns brown and smells different is an example of this type of change.
What is a chemical change?
The wearing away of rocks by wind, water, or ice is known as this.
What is weathering?
A push or a pull is defined as this.
What is a force?
Name one of the four main spheres of the Earth system.
What is the geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, or biosphere?
This term describes all the living and nonliving things interacting in an area.
What is an ecosystem?
Name the three common states of matter.
What are solid, liquid, and gas?
What is the primary cause of day and night on Earth?
What is Earth's rotation on its axis?
Name one way that heat energy can be transferred.
What is conduction, convection, or radiation?
Explain the relationship between mass and the force of gravity.
The greater the mass of an object, the stronger the force of gravity it exerts.
Describe one way a change in the population of one organism in a food web can affect the populations of other organisms.
Answers will vary but should describe a direct or indirect impact, such as an increase in a predator population leading to a decrease in its prey, or vice versa.
Explain the difference between a mixture and a solution, providing an example of each.
A mixture is a combination where substances retain their properties (e.g., sand and water). A solution is a mixture where one substance dissolves into another (e.g., salt and water).
Describe how the interaction between the atmosphere and the hydrosphere leads to precipitation.
Water evaporates from the hydrosphere into the atmosphere, cools and condenses to form clouds, and then falls back to Earth as precipitation (rain, snow, sleet, or hail).
Explain why a ball rolling on a flat surface eventually comes to a stop in terms of forces.
Friction between the ball and the surface opposes the motion of the ball, causing it to slow down and eventually stop.
A student designs a ramp to roll a ball down. They test different ramp heights and measure how far the ball travels. What is one question the student could be investigating with this experiment?
Possible answers include: How does the height of the ramp affect the distance the ball travels? How does potential energy convert to kinetic energy as the ball rolls down the ramp?