Ecosystem Balance After a Change

Ask your child to count the kinds of plants and animals in a yard, park or school field and compare two spots, the same way the pond and lawn pages do. Remind them that biodiversity counts kinds, not totals. Check each page with the answer key.

Read rabbit and fox counts on an island to see how a change spreads. An ecosystem is all the living and nonliving things in an area. A predator hunts animals for food; its prey is the animal it eats. When one group changes, others change too. The directions on the page read: Read the island data table. Then, answer questions 1 to 6. The answer key shows every answer.

Yes, both. We made it for 5th Grade ecosystems, and the page works the same whether it lands on a kitchen table or a center rotation. At home, most families go through it together and talk the answers out loud, and that talking is where most of the learning happens with biodiversity. In class it runs well as independent work while you pull a small group. Print one copy or thirty, whichever the day needs.

Biodiversity is the variety of living things in a place. It counts kinds, not totals: a pond with five species has more biodiversity than a pond with forty snails and two frogs.

An ecosystem with many kinds of living things can handle a change better. If one kind of tree is lost, others still give animals food and shelter. Biodiversity also brings pollinators, rich soil and many medicines.

When foxes arrived on an island, rabbit numbers fell, and then fox numbers fell too because there was less food. Predators and prey keep changing each other until the ecosystem settles into a new balance.

Yes. All five biodiversity sheets have an answer key that shows every answer, including sample answers for the questions children explain in their own words.

5 printable worksheets, all free to preview. Downloads are included with a ClassWeekly free trial, and every page prints on standard 8.5 x 11 paper.

These are written for 5th Grade students, roughly ages 10-11. Many teachers also use them a grade up for review or a grade down as an extension, so use the preview to judge the fit for a particular child.

Yes. Each one shows the NGSS code it covers on its own page, so you can check the alignment yourself rather than taking our word for it.