Download Animals, Plants, and Conservation - NC Science Wiki

North Carolina Science Essential Standards
1.L.1 Resource Pack: Animals, Plants, and Conservation
Essential Standard:
1.L.1 Understand characteristics of various environments and behaviors of humans that enable
plants and animals to survive.
Clarifying Objectives:
1.L.1.1 Recognize that plants and animals need air, water, light (plants only), space, food and shelter and
that these may be found in their environment.
1.L.1.2 Give examples of how the needs of different plants and animals can be met by their environments
in North Carolina or different places throughout the world.
1.L.1.3 Summarize ways that humans protect their environment and/or improve conditions for the
growth of the plants and animals that live there(e.g., reuse or recycle products to avoid littering).
Vertical Strand Maps:
NCES Interdependence of Life http://scnces.ncdpi.wikispaces.net/Strand+Maps
Online Atlas maps:
http://strandmaps.dls.ucar.edu/?id=SMS-MAP-1405
http://strandmaps.dls.ucar.edu/?id=SMS-MAP-2122
http://strandmaps.dls.ucar.edu/?id=SMS-MAP-1437
http://strandmaps.dls.ucar.edu/?id=SMS-MAP-0048
North Carolina Unpacking:
http://scnces.ncdpi.wikispaces.net/Race+to+the+Top+Support+Tools
Teacher Content & Concept Knowledge
Framework for K-12 Science Education
How and why do organisms interact with their environment and what are the effects of these interactions?
Ecosystems are complex, interactive systems that include both biological communities (biotic) and physical (abiotic)
components of the environment. As with individual organisms, a hierarchal structure exists; groups of the same organisms
(species) form populations, different populations interact to form communities,communities live within an ecosystem, and all of
the ecosystems on Earth make up the biosphere. Organisms grow, reproduce, and perpetuate their species by obtaining
necessary resources through interdependent relationships with other organisms and the physical environment. These same
interactions can facilitate or restrain growth and enhance or limit the size of populations, maintaining the balance between
available resources and those who consume them. These interactions can also change both biotic and abiotic characteristics of
the environment. Like individual organisms, ecosystems are sustained by the continuous flow of energy, originating primarily
from the sun, and the recycling of matter and nutrients within the system. Ecosystems are dynamic, experiencing shifts in
population composition and abundance and changes in the physical environment over time, which ultimately affects the stability
and resilience of the entire system.
LS2.A: INTERDEPENDENT RELATIONSHIPS IN ECOSYSTEMS
How do organisms interact with the living and nonliving environments to obtain matter and energy?
Ecosystems are ever changing because of the interdependence of organisms of the same or different species and the
nonliving (physical) elements of the environment. Seeking matter and energy resources to sustain life, organisms in an
ecosystem interact with one another in complex feeding hierarchies of producers, consumers, and decomposers, which
together represent a food web. Interactions between organisms may be predatory, competitive, or mutually beneficial.
Ecosystems have carrying capacities that limit the number of organisms (within populations) they can support.
Individual survival and population sizes depend on such factors as predation, disease, availability of resources, and
parameters of the physical environment. Organisms rely on physical factors, such as light, temperature, water, soil, and
space for shelter and reproduction. Earth’s varied combinations of these factors provide the physical environments in
which its ecosystems (e.g., deserts, grasslands, rain forests, and coral reefs) develop and in which the diverse species of
the planet live. Within any one ecosystem, the biotic interactions between organisms (e.g., competition, predation, and
various types of facilitation, such as pollination) further influence their growth, survival, and reproduction both
individually and in terms of their populations.
Grade Band Endpoints for LS2.A
By the end of grade 2. Animals depend on their surroundings to get what they need, including food, water, shelter, and a
favorable temperature. Animals depend on plants or other animals for food. They use their senses to find food and
water, and they use their body parts to gather, catch, eat, and chew the food. Plants depend on air, water, minerals (in
the soil), and light to grow. Animals can move around, but plants cannot, and they often depend on animals for
pollination or to move their seeds around. Different plants survive better in different settings because they have varied
needs for water, minerals, and sunlight.
By the end of grade 5. The food of almost any kind of animal can be traced back to plants. Organisms are related in food
webs in which some animals eat plants for food and other animals eat the animals that eat plants. Either way, they are
“consumers.” Some organisms, such as fungi and bacteria, break down dead organisms (both plants or plants parts and
animals) and therefore operate as “decomposers.” Decomposition eventually restores (recycles) some materials back to
the soil for plants to use. Organisms can survive only in environments in which their particular needs are met. A healthy
ecosystem is one in which multiple species of different types are each able to meet their needs in a relatively stable web
of life. Newly introduced species can damage the balance of an ecosystem.
LS2.C: ECOSYSTEM DYNAMICS, FUNCTIONING, AND RESILIENCE
What happens to ecosystems when the environment changes?
Ecosystems are dynamic in nature; their characteristics fluctuate over time, depending on changes in the environment
and in the populations of various species. Disruptions in the physical and biological components of an ecosystem—
which can lead to shifts in the types and numbers of the ecosystem’s organisms, to the maintenance or the extinction of
species, to the migration of species into or out of the region, or to the formation of new species (speciation)—occur for a
variety of natural reasons. Changes may derive from the fall of canopy trees in a forest, for example, or from cataclysmic
events, such as volcanic eruptions. But many changes are induced by human activity, such as resource extraction,
adverse land use patterns, pollution, introduction of nonnative species, and global climate change. Extinction of species
or evolution of new species may occur in response to significant ecosystem disruptions.
Species in an environment develop behavioral and physiological patterns that facilitate their survival under the
prevailing conditions, but these patterns may be maladapted when conditions change or new species are introduced.
Ecosystems with a wide variety of species—that is, greater biodiversity—tend to be more resilient to change than those
with few species.
Grade Band Endpoints for LS2.C
By the end of grade 2. The places where plants and animals live often change, sometimes slowly and sometimes rapidly.
When animals and plants get too hot or too cold, they may die. If they cannot find enough food, water, or air, they may
die.
By the end of grade 5. When the environment changes in ways that affect a place’s physical characteristics,
temperature, or availability of resources, some organisms survive and reproduce, others move to new locations, yet
others move into the transformed environment, and some die.
LS4.C: ADAPTATION
How does the environment influence populations of organisms over multiple generations?
When an environment changes, there can be subsequent shifts in its supply of resources or in the physical and biological
challenges it imposes. Some individuals in a population may have morphological, physiological, or behavioral traits that
provide a reproductive advantage in the face of the shifts in the environment.
Natural selection provides a mechanism for species to adapt to changes in their environment. The resulting selective
pressures influence the survival and reproduction of organisms over many generations and can change the distribution
of traits in the population. This process is called adaptation. Adaptation can lead to organisms that are better suited for
their environment because individuals with the traits adaptive to the environmental change pass those traits on to their
offspring, whereas individuals with traits that are less adaptive produce fewer or no offspring. Over time, adaptation can
lead to the formation of new species. In some cases, however, traits that are adaptive to the changed environment do not
exist in the population and the species becomes extinct. Adaptive changes due to natural selection, as well as the net
result of speciation minus extinction, have strongly contributed to the planet’s biodiversity.
Adaption by natural selection is ongoing. For example it is seen in the emergence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
Organisms like bacteria, in which multiple generations occur over shorter time spans, evolve more rapidly than those for
which each generation takes multiple years.
Grade Band Endpoints for LS4.C
By the end of grade 2. Living things can survive only where their needs are met. If some places are too hot or too cold or
have too little water or food, plants and animals may not be able to live there.
By the end of grade 5. Changes in an organism’s habitat are sometimes beneficial to it and sometimes harmful. For any
particular environment, some kinds of organisms survive well, some survive less well, and some cannot survive at all.
LS4.D: BIODIVERSITY AND HUMANS
What is biodiversity, how do humans affect it, and how does it affect humans?
Human beings are part of and depend on the natural world. Biodiversity—the multiplicity of genes, species, and ecosystems—
provides humans with renewable resources, such as food, medicines, and clean water. Humans also benefit from “ecosystem
services,” such as climate stabilization, decomposition of wastes, and pollination that are provided by healthy (i.e., diverse and
resilient) ecosystems.
The resources of biological communities can be used within sustainable limits, but in many cases humans affect these
ecosystems in ways—including habitat destruction, pollution of air and water, overexploitation of resources, introduction of
invasive species, and climate change—that prevent the sustainable use of resources and lead to ecosystem degradation, species
extinction, and the loss of valuable ecosystem services.
Grade Band Endpoints for LS4.D
By the end of grade 2. There are many different kinds of living things in any area, and they exist in different places on land and
in water.
By the end of grade 5. Scientists have identified and classified many plants and animals. Populations of organisms live in a
variety of habitats, and change in those habitats affects the organisms living there. Humans, like all other organisms, obtain
living and nonliving resources from their environments.
ESS2.A: EARTH MATERIALS AND SYSTEMS
All Earth processes are the result of energy flowing and matter cycling within and among Earth’s systems. This energy
originates from the sun and from Earth’s interior. Transfers of energy and the movements of matter can cause chemical
and physical changes among Earth’s materials and living organisms. Solid rocks, for example, can be formed by the
cooling of molten rock, the accumulation and consolidation of sediments, or the alteration of older rocks by heat,
pressure, and fluids. These processes occur under different circumstances and produce different types of rock. Physical
and chemical interactions among rocks, sediments, water, air, and plants and animals produce soil. In the carbon, water,
and nitrogen cycles, materials cycle between living and nonliving forms and among the atmosphere, soil, rocks, and
ocean.
Science for All Americans:
INTERDEPENDENCE OF LIFE
Every species is linked, directly or indirectly, with a multitude of others in an ecosystem. Plants provide food,
shelter, and nesting sites for other organisms. For their part, many plants depend upon animals for help in
reproduction (bees pollinate flowers, for instance) and for certain nutrients (such as minerals in animal waste
products). All animals are part of food webs that include plants and animals of other species (and sometimes the
same species). The predator/prey relationship is common, with its offensive tools for predators—teeth, beaks,
claws, venom, etc.—and its defensive tools for prey—camouflage to hide, speed to escape, shields or spines to
ward off, irritating substances to repel. Some species come to depend very closely on others (for instance,
pandas or koalas can eat only certain species of trees). Some species have become so adapted to each other that
neither could survive without the other (for example, the wasps that nest only in figs and are the only insect that
can pollinate them).
There are also other relationships between organisms. Parasites get nourishment from their host organisms,
sometimes with bad consequences for the hosts. Scavengers and decomposers feed only on dead animals and
plants. And some organisms have mutually beneficial relationships—for example, the bees that sip nectar from
flowers and incidentally carry pollen from one flower to the next, or the bacteria that live in our intestines and
incidentally synthesize some vitamins and protect the intestinal lining from germs.
But the interaction of living organisms does not take place on a passive environmental stage. Ecosystems are
shaped by the nonliving environment of land and water—solar radiation, rainfall, mineral concentrations,
temperature, and topography. The world contains a wide diversity of physical conditions, which creates a wide
variety of environments: freshwater and oceanic, forest, desert, grassland, tundra, mountain, and many others.
In all these environments, organisms use vital earth resources, each seeking its share in specific ways that are
limited by other organisms. In every part of the habitable environment, different organisms vie for food, space,
light, heat, water, air, and shelter. The linked and fluctuating interactions of life forms and environment
compose a total ecosystem; understanding any one part of it well requires knowledge of how that part interacts
with the others.
The interdependence of organisms in an ecosystem often results in approximate stability over hundreds or
thousands of years. As one species proliferates, it is held in check by one or more environmental factors:
depletion of food or nesting sites, increased loss to predators, or invasion by parasites. If a natural disaster such
as flood or fire occurs, the damaged ecosystem is likely to recover in a succession of stages that eventually
results in a system similar to the original one.
Like many complex systems, ecosystems tend to show cyclic fluctuations around a state of approximate
equilibrium. In the long run, however, ecosystems inevitably change when climate changes or when very
different new species appear as a result of migration or evolution (or are introduced deliberately or inadvertently
by humans).
Earth processes
Plants and animals reshape the landscape in many ways. The composition and texture of the soil, and
consequently its fertility and resistance to erosion, are greatly influenced by plant roots and debris, bacteria, and
fungi that add organic material to the soil, and by insects, worms, and burrowing animals that break it up.
Benchmarks for Science Literacy:
It is not difficult for students to grasp the general notion that species depend on one another and on the environment for
survival. But their awareness must be supported by knowledge of the kinds of relationships that exist among organisms,
the kinds of physical conditions that organisms must cope with, the kinds of environments created by the interaction of
organisms with one another and their physical surroundings, and the complexity of such systems. Students should become
acquainted with many different examples of ecosystems, starting with those near at hand.
K-2: Students should investigate the habitats of many different kinds of local plants and animals, including weeds,
aquatic plants, insects, worms, and amphibians, and some of the ways in which animals depend on plants and on each
other.
By the end of the 2nd grade, students should know that
 Animals eat plants or other animals for food and may also use plants (or even other animals) for shelter and nesting.
5D/P1
 Living things are found almost everywhere in the world. There are somewhat different kinds in different places.
5D/P2
3-5: Students should explore how various organisms satisfy their needs in the environments in which they are typically
found. They can examine the survival needs of different organisms and consider how the conditions in particular habitats
can limit what kinds of living things can survive. Their studies of interactions among organisms within an environment
should start with relationships they can directly observe. By viewing nature films, students should see a great diversity of
life in different habitats.
By the end of the 5th grade, students should know that
 For any particular environment, some kinds of plants and animals thrive, some do not live as well, and some do
not survive at all. 5D/E1*
 Insects and various other organisms depend on dead plant and animal material for food. 5D/E2
 Organisms interact with one another in various ways besides providing food. 5D/E3a
 Many plants depend on animals for carrying their pollen to other plants or for dispersing their seeds. 5D/E3b
 Changes in an organism's habitat are sometimes beneficial to it and sometimes harmful. 5D/E4
 Most microorganisms do not cause disease, and many are beneficial. 5D/E5
Processes that Shape the Earth
Students should learn what causes earthquakes, volcanos, and floods and how those events shape the
surface of the earth. Students, however, may show more interest in the phenomena than in the role the
phenomena play in sculpting the earth. So teachers should start with students' immediate interests and
work toward the science. Students may find it harder to take seriously the less-obvious, less-dramatic,
long-term effects of erosion by wind and water, annual deposits of sediment, the creep of continents, and
the rise of mountains. Students' recognition of those effects will depend on an improving sense of long
time periods and familiarity with the effect of multiplying tiny fractions by very large numbers (in this
case, slow rates by long times).
Students can start in the early grades with the ways in which organisms, themselves included, modify
their surroundings. As people have used earth resources, they have altered some earth systems. Students
can gradually come to recognize how human behavior affects the earth's capacity to sustain life.
Questions of environmental policy should be pursued when students become interested in them, usually
in the middle grades or later, but care should be taken not to bypass science for advocacy. Critical
thinking based on scientific concepts and understanding is the primary goal for science education.
By the end of the 2nd grade, students should know that
 Chunks of rocks come in many sizes and shapes, from boulders to grains of sand and even smaller.
4C/P1
 Change is something that happens to many things. 4C/P2
 Animals and plants sometimes cause changes in their surroundings. 4C/P3
By the end of the 5th grade, students should know that
 Waves, wind, water, and ice shape and reshape the earth's land surface by eroding rock and
soil in some areas and depositing them in other areas, sometimes in seasonal layers. 4C/E1
 Rock is composed of different combinations of minerals. Smaller rocks come from the breakage
and weathering of bedrock and larger rocks. Soil is made partly from weathered rock, partly
from plant remains—and also contains many living organisms. 4C/E2
Big Ideas:
Patterns
Systems and System Models
Stability and Change
Essential Questions:
What are the basic characteristics of environments?
What are the basic needs of plants and animals?
How do environments in North Carolina meet the needs of the organisms that live there?
How can humans protect the environment?
How can humans improve the conditions for the growth of plants and animals in a particular
environment?
Enduring Understandings:
All organisms have basic needs that must be met in order to survive.
Organisms find the thing that they need in their environment in order to survive.
When an environment changes, the organisms that live there will be affected.
Humans can affect an environment in ways that impact organisms that live there.
Identify Misconceptions:
Formative assessment probe guide
http://scnces.ncdpi.wikispaces.net/file/view/K5%20Probe%20Alignment%20to%20Essential%20Standards_Revised%20June%202016.xlsx.pdf/5870
51295/K5%20Probe%20Alignment%20to%20Essential%20Standards_Revised%20June%202016.xlsx.pdf
Common Misconceptions
http://www.education.vic.gov.au/school/teachers/teachingresources/discipline/science/continuum/Pa
ges/livingthings.aspx
http://www.learner.org/courses/essential/life/support/1_Livingthings.pdf
http://beyondpenguins.ehe.osu.edu/issue/polar-mammals/common-misconceptions-about-mammals
http://beyondpenguins.ehe.osu.edu/issue/polar-plants/common-misconceptions-about-plants
http://www.homeofbob.com/science/misconceptions/plants.html
Instructional Resources:
Earth Day and the Environment
Lessons and activities for Earth Day and beyond that help students build awareness of our planet’s needs
and develop ways to meet them.
http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/unit/earth-day-and-environment-everything-you-need
Eeko World
EekoWorld features fifteen lesson plans. There are three lessons for each grade level from kindergarten
through grade four. The lesson plans contain the following components: overviews, grade level, learning
objectives, building background activities, learning activities, extension activities, and standards. The
educational standards for all the lessons are compiled by grade ranges from K-2 and 3-5.
http://pbskids.org/eekoworld//parentsteachers/lessons.html
The Needs of Living Things
In this lesson, students watch video clips of animals and plants in their natural environment, to gather
evidence that all living things have basic needs that must be met in order to survive. Then, to illustrate
their understanding of this concept, students draw pictures of real or imaginary pets eating, drinking,
breathing, and taking shelter (from the elements or from other animals).
http://www.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/tdc02.sci.life.colt.lp_stayalive/the-needs-of-living-things/
Needs of Plants and Animals
A collection of Power Point slides that teachers can use to teach these concepts.
http://www.compton.k12.ca.us/pages/departments/Curriculum/PDF/1stGradeUnitBChp3_5.pdf
Plant and Animal Needs
Plants and animals change as they grow. Animals need food, water, shelter, air, and space to survive.
Plants need nutrients, water, air light, and a place with adequate space for them to grow.
http://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/standards_docs/science/2010/lesson_plans/kindergarten/life
_processes/sess_K-7ab.pdf
NCES 1.L1 Live Binder
A live binder collection dedicated to ES 1.L.1.
http://www.livebinders.com/play/play?id=478503
Plants and Animals Unit
Students investigate the basic needs of plants and animals, and more.
https://www.georgiastandards.org/Frameworks/GSO%20Frameworks/1%20Science%20Framework%
20Plants%20and%20Animals.pdf
Beyond penguins and Polar Bears: Plants
Plants are a common topic in elementary classrooms for good reason – they are an effective, inexpensive
way for students to observe living organisms and life cycles firsthand. Primary students often focus on
familiar plants, basic plant structures and their functions, and our use of plants as a food source. In the
upper-elementary grades, students investigate germination, plant life cycles, and flowering and seed
production in more detail. These students are also ready to consider the diversity of plants around the
world and the adaptations that allow plants to survive in very different environments.
http://beyondpenguins.ehe.osu.edu/issue/polar-plants/hands-on-lessons-and-activities-about-plants
PBL Unit Plants and Animals
All around us are plants and animals. We see plants and animals at school, at our homes, and while we
are in our cars. In this unit students will explore the world around them through a visit to the zoo and by
growing plants.
http://www2.davidson.k12.nc.us/pbl/eett/EETT0506/Plants%20and%20Animals%20PBL.pdf
CScope Unit: Basic Needs of Plants and Animals
http://www.bigspringisd.net/Uploads/177/misc/f266918.pdf
Bright Hub – Animals Have Needs Too
Helping students understand characteristics of animals is a major portion of the first grade science
curriculum. With these animal basic needs lesson plans, your first graders will understand the needs of
pets and other animals. You can extend the lesson to include the interdependence of plants and animals,
as well.
http://www.brighthubeducation.com/lesson-plans-grades-1-2/102180-the-basic-needs-of-animalsfirst-grade-lesson/
Needs of Animals – Learn NC
In this lesson plan first grade students will examine photographs of 4-H club members with animals from
North Carolina. They will make observations from the visual material to build an understanding of the
needs of animals. They will begin to learn that these needs have remained the same in different times.
http://www.learnnc.org/lp/pages/1626
Who Needs What – Teach Engineering
In an introductory discussion, students identify the physical needs of animals and then speculate on the
needs of plants. With teacher guidance, students then design an experiment that can take place in the
classroom to test whether or not plants need light and water in order to grow. This prepares them to
conduct the associated activity in which sunflower seeds are planted in plastic cups, and once
germinated, are exposed to different conditions. In a classroom setting it is easy to test for the effects of
light versus darkness, and watered versus non-watered conditions. During exposure of the plants to
these different conditions, students measure growth of the seedlings every few days using non-standard
measurement. After a few weeks, they compare the growth of plants exposed to the different conditions,
and make pictorial bar graphs that demonstrate these comparisons.
https://www.teachengineering.org/lessons/view/duk_sunflower_mary_less
Bottle Biology
http://resources.fastplants.org//agriscience/agriscienceappendixa.pdf
North Carolina Species
http://www.ncwildlife.org/Learning/Species
North Carolina Environmental Education
http://web.eenorthcarolina.org/core/item/topic.aspx?tid=85010
NC Environmental Education resources
http://www.projectwild.org/growingupwild/NorthCarolina.htm
http://deq.nc.gov/node/83115
https://forestry.ces.ncsu.edu/ncplt/
http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/detail/?ss=16&navtype=BROWSEBYSUBJECT&cid=nrcs143
_022018&navid=220120000000000&position=Not%20Yet%20Determined.Html&ttype=detail
http://www.fs.usda.gov/main/conservationeducation/educator-toolbox/elementary
http://www.projectwild.org/growingupwild.htm
Video Resources:
Bill Nye – garbage - http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3cvox0?GK_FACEBOOK_OG_HTML5=1
I’ve got a habitat - http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3cvox0?GK_FACEBOOK_OG_HTML5=1
Habitat Song - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVPyjukPxFA
Habitat – Old McDonald - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlFl2jXhUV4
Berenstain bears – the trouble with pets
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBc6Ri4MK9Y&list=PLpTWh6VEf2n98HbsesnNLjfwFTAIRlFYd
Word Walls:
https://www.google.com/search?q=1st+grade+habitats+vocabulary&biw=1369&bih=1157&source=lnm
s&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjprZan77vOAhVMSCYKHZPtC8UQ_AUIBigB&dpr=0.75#tbm=isch&q=H
abitats+word+wall+grade+1
https://www.google.com/search?q=1st+grade+habitats+vocabulary&biw=1369&bih=1157&source=lnm
s&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjprZan77vOAhVMSCYKHZPtC8UQ_AUIBigB&dpr=0.75#tbm=isch&q=H
abitats+word+wall+grade+K%2C+1%2C+2
https://www.google.com/search?q=1st+grade+habitats+vocabulary&biw=1369&bih=1157&source=lnm
s&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjprZan77vOAhVMSCYKHZPtC8UQ_AUIBigB&dpr=0.75#tbm=isch&q=R
educe+Reuse+Recycle+word+wall+grade+K%2C+1%2C+2
https://www.google.com/search?q=1st+grade+habitats+vocabulary&biw=1369&bih=1157&source=lnm
s&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjprZan77vOAhVMSCYKHZPtC8UQ_AUIBigB&dpr=0.75#tbm=isch&q=+
wildlife+conservation+word+wall+grade+1
Writing Prompts:
1. Create a two-sided pamphlet that illustrates the needs of plants on one side and the needs of animals on the
other side.
2. Work in a group to create an alphabet picture book that features plants and animals.
3. Create a pamphlet to hand out on Earth Day that encourages people to reduce, reuse, and recycle.
4. Create a mobile of wild animals that live in North Carolina,
5. Create a museum display for a plant that grows in North Carolina. Include a sample of the plant (a
picture is okay) and give a brief description of it on a display card.