Grade 04 Science - EC: S4.B.3.1.2

Continuum of Activities

The list below represents a continuum of activities: resources categorized by Standard/Eligible Content that teachers may use to move students toward proficiency. Using LEA curriculum and available materials and resources, teachers can customize the activity statements/questions for classroom use.

This continuum of activities offers:

Instructional activities designed to be integrated into planned lessons
Questions/activities that grow in complexity
Opportunities for differentiation for each student’s level of performance

Grade Levels

4th Grade

Course, Subject

Science

Related Academic Standards / Eligible Content

S4.B.3.1.2 S4.B.3.1.2

Describe interactions between living and nonliving components (e.g. plants – water, soil, sunlight, carbon dioxide, temperature; animals – food, water, shelter, oxygen, temperature) of a local ecosystem.

Activities

Name three things that plants need in order to survive.
Name three nonliving things that are part of the ecosystem in your backyard.

Predict what would happen to the living things in your ecosystem if the temperature changed to one similar to a desert ecosystem’s temperature. Explain why you think this would happen?

List two living and two nonliving things in the same ecosystem. Write a paragraph to explain the relationships between these living and nonliving things that help the ecosystem to function.
Write a paragraph to explain how sunlight, soil, carbon dioxide and a tree are related in an ecosystem.

Answer Key/Rubric

Examples include, but are not limited to: carbon dioxide, water, sunlight, soil, space, nutrients
Examples include, but are not limited to: soil, rocks, air, sunlight

Acceptable responses might include, but are not limited to:

Many of the plants would die
- A desert is very hot, and water evaporates quickly
- The plants in our ecosystem require lots of water
- Without a great deal of water, the plants will die
Many of the animals will die
- If the plants die, then the animals that rely on these plants will also die

Student lists two living and two nonliving things in the same ecosystem. Student thoroughly and accurately explains the relationship between said living and nonliving things. Explained relationships might include, but are not limited to:

Food source
Shelter
Survival

Acceptable responses might include, but are not limited to:

A tree needs soil to grow
A tree needs carbon dioxide and energy from sunlight to make its food through photosynthesis.