Ecosystems & The Food Web Unit
⭐ New - Lesson 1: What if all the ants disappeared?
- Replaces: Why would a hawk move to New York City?
- New exploration, discussion questions, & wrap-up. Same activity.
⭐ New - Lesson 2: How does a tiny seed become one of the heaviest trees on Earth?
- Replaces: What do plants eat?
- New exploration, discussion questions, activity, & wrap-up.
⭐ New - Lesson 3: Where do fallen leaves go?
- Replaces: Where do fallen leaves go? (yes, same name!)
- New exploration, discussion questions, activity, & wrap-up.
- New supplies: 1 plastic plate & 1 Dixie cup (already included in Packs)
📝 Revised - Anchor Layer (Coming soon)
Why did Mystery Science make these curriculum updates?
Ecosystems & The Food Web Unit
- ⭐ New - Lesson 1: What if all the ants disappeared?
- Replaces: Why would a hawk move to New York City?
- 5-LS2-1. Develop a model to describe the movement of matter among plants, animals, decomposers, and the environment.
- Reasons for Replacement: This lesson was previously missing a wrap-up and as the first lesson in our 5th grade life science unit, we wanted to update this lesson to add this important piece. In doing so, we also aimed to increase the standard alignment, therefore increasing one aspect of “rigor”. Instead of the previous focus on predators and prey (a concept for younger students), the revised lesson focuses on ecosystems and encourages students to think about food webs, and the flow of matter within those food webs. This lesson previously had one of our most popular hands-on activities – Eat or Be Eaten – and we promise it’s still there! We did a slight refresh of the game, based on teacher reviews. The biggest change is that we added arrows to the cards, a common teacher request, to show the direction of matter flow in an ecosystem.
- ⭐ New - Lesson 2: How does a tiny seed become one of the heaviest trees on Earth?
- Replaces: What do plants eat?
- 5-LS1-1. Support an argument that plants get the materials they need for growth chiefly from air and water.
- Reasons for Replacement: We developed this lesson and activity to replace the current lesson in response to teachers reporting having many difficulties with the activity, Weighing Air. The classroom balance scale was difficult to construct and often didn’t work, leading to students forming misconceptions about the weight of air. So we refocused the lesson to more broadly ask students to consider where plant matter comes from. Through a series of virtual experiments, students gather evidence about which materials (soil, water, or air) plants are using for their growth. We ask students to make a claim about which material(s) they think plants are using, and back up their statements using evidence they’ve gathered throughout the lesson. Evidence should support student understanding that plants get the materials for their growth mainly from air and water.
- ⭐ New - Lesson 3: Where do fallen leaves go?
- Replaces: Where do fallen leaves go? (yes, same name!)
- 5-LS2-1. Develop a model to describe the movement of matter among plants, animals, decomposers, and the environment.
- Reasons for Revision: We developed this lesson to replace our current lesson of the same name “Where do fallen leaves go” for several reasons. One of the main reasons is the previous activity, Mold Terrarium, involved lots of supplies many of which were food items. The activity also focused on using controls & variables to discover the conditions that inhibit or encourage mold growth, which are worthwhile investigations, but aren’t quite aligned to the standard. The lesson also did not have a wrap-up, and previously included a problematic vocab term we identified as a potential cause for student misconception. We kept the phenomenon of disappearing fall leaves, but instead refocused the lesson on decomposers and what happens to that fallen leaf matter. The hands-on activity now follows a forest floor who-done-it investigation where students read passages and look for clues about how several “suspects” contributed to the decomposition of leaves. Through this investigation, students discover that fallen leaves don’t disappear, instead the matter is broken down and some is cycled back into the soil. For teachers who loved the previous Mold Terrarium activity, we will be linking this as an activity extension in the new lesson.