Download What is an Ecosystem? - Grade 7 Science is Awesome!

Grade 7 Science
Interactions in the Environment
Lesson 2
• Learning Goals:
• Demonstrate understanding of the components of an
ecosystem and how they interact.
• Understand science terminology for ecosystems.
• Success Criteria:
• I can explain the concept of an ecosystem and describe the
components that make up an ecosystem.
• I can describe some examples of ecosystems.
• I can use science terminology in my explanations.
• Biotic Elements are the living part of an
environment such as plants and animals. Biotic
elements in an environment affect one another.
Can you think of examples of this?
• Living things are also known as organisms.
Organisms that can only be seen with a
microscope are micro-organisms (e.g. bacteria
and algae).
• Species: a group of similar
organisms that can mate to
produce more of the same type
of organism
• Population: a group of
organisms of the same species in
a given area
• Community: a group of
populations of different species in
a given area
• Abiotic elements are the non-living parts of
the environment. They include sunlight, air, rain,
snow, sand dunes, rock and water. Abiotic elements
provide many of the things that organisms need to
survive. Can you think of examples of how abiotic
elements are important for organisms?
• Ecosystem: the network of interactions that link
the living and non-living parts of an environment.
• Ecosystems can be small or large. Large ecosystems
often contains smaller ecosystems. (Think a rotting log
in a forest.)
• A biome is a very large ecosystem or a collection of
ecosystems with similar biotic and abiotic factors in
them.
• Let’s look at some examples:
• Cool Facts About Ecosystems
• Here a couple of good videos to help explain what
we talked about today a little bit more….
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdlwPtKg-VI
• Abiotic and Biotic Factors – Case studies of
relationships
• (Note: Section of video 2:15-4:22 discusses cells –
you will study this more in grade 8)