Overview- ecology is the study of interactions. This includes those between living things, and the world around them. This unit can be broken down into a few general areas: Food Web: food interactions are at the heart of ecology, students should know how to set up a food web (arrows point like a spoon to the eater), and how to read one. Students should also be able to put that information into an energy pyramid. Terms: habitat, niche, ecosystem, population, community, producer, consumer, autotroph, heterotroph, herbivore, carnivore, omnivore, detritivore, primary consumer, secondary consumer. Symbiosis: looks at long term interactions such as mutualism (both species happy), parasitism (one species happy, one not), and commensalism (one species happy, but the other does not care), this area also includes predator prey interactions, and how those interactions affect long term stability of a community. Population Growth: As mentioned with predator prey groups, populations can be stable, but in different ways. Population growths can be graphed (thus important from the first unit to remember graphing), Graphs can be analyzed to determine if a population has reached carrying capacity, or if the population is growing exponentially. Biomes- Large general areas determined by temperature and precipitation (we will each be doing a travel brochure on a fun or interesting place to visit) |