Producers, Consumers and Decomposers

Start with Producers, Consumers and Decomposers so the roles are clear, then read the pond food web. Have students show their division on the energy pyramid before moving on to the carbon cycle.

Sort 12 organisms such as the vulture and earthworm into five roles and explain decomposers. The directions on the page read: Read the text and study the diagram. Then complete page 2. An answer key is included.

Yes, both. We made it for 6th 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 food webs and matter cycles. In class it runs well as independent work while you pull a small group. Print one copy or thirty, whichever the day needs.

Each arrow points from a living thing to the animal that eats it, so the arrows show the direction energy flows. Reading a Food Web has students use these arrows to trace food chains and predict what happens if minnows vanish.

A scavenger, such as a vulture, is a type of carnivore that eats animals that are already dead. A decomposer breaks down dead plants, dead animals and animal wastes and returns nutrients to the soil.

Plants take carbon dioxide from the air in photosynthesis, and carbon moves into animals when they eat. Living things return it through respiration, decomposers release it, carbon dioxide dissolves into seawater, and burning fossil fuels adds it to the air.