We live in a 'closed’ environment, in the sense that all living organisms on this planet rely on the success or failure of other organisms. Apart from the energy of the Sun, everything has to be recycled and used over and over again There are many different forms of relationship between the living things that coexist on Earth: direct competition for the same space or food source; symbiotic relationships that benefit two species at once; and food relationships where both species can thrive when balanced. The 'interrelatedness' of organisms, and the way that different organisms find different niches and means of survival will be considered here. The key ideas to be developed are:
1 ecosystem will survive if there is a sufficient diversity of life and there is an interdependence between the members of that ecosystem.
2. Energy (or food) chains exist and continue where there are ‘pyramids' of numbers or biomass: primary producers (such as green plants) supporting successively smaller numbers of organisms at each level of the pyramid.
3 Each living organism is adapted to fulfil a particular role within a particular ecological niche.
Teaching Concepts
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Concept 1: The diversity of Life
Concept 3: Adaptation to Environment
It is important to be aware of how these concepts can be developed in teaching. The following is one way in which the progression can be described. It goes up to Key Stage 3, because it is necessary to know where the children will be going next.To demonstrate your own understanding of the concepts, it is useful to produce your own concept chain.
Many different plants and animals coexist in the local environment. There are many different environments. Different environments support different plants and animals. Different plants and animals are suited to different environments. What particular animals are present in a particular environment depends on the availability of food.
Animals and plants are adapted to the environments in which they can be found. An environment consists of a number of factors, including the terrain, and the availability of water, heat, light and nutrition. Changes to the environment will require that the living things either adapt or relocate to survive. Seasonal environmental changes often result in behavioural adaptation, physical change, migration or a period of dormancy for the organisms living there. There are feeding relationships in every ecosystem that can be traced from primary producer to higher predator, Energy cycles can be completed by decomposers (such as fungi and some micro-organisms) that return important chemicals to the soil. The environment in which an organism can be found can be deduced from a study of the organism's features.
The population of an organism within an environment depends on how successfully it competes for food and space with other organisms occupying the same niche. Humans have a significant effect on the environment, causing many changes. A foreign organism introduced to a closed environment will cause changes in the numbers of other organisms. Artificial environments may be used to farm particular species of plant or animal, Green plants produce energy in a form that can be consumed by other organisms, particularly animals. The chemical building blocks of living things, such as carbon and nitrogen, require constant recycling within an ecosystem..