Food Webs in a Biome Project NGSS Disciplinary Core Ideas- LS2.A and LS2.B

This project has been design to integrate the ideas of biomes and the food webs within them. It is important for your students to be aware that the abiotic and biotic components of a biome have a delicate interaction, shaping one another. This project will help the students make connections between the abiotic factors, such as climate and soil type or salinity, to the biotic factors in the food web. As well, the project is designed to reinforce the vocabulary, applying it in their use of the food web that they will create. An oral presentation of this project will provide an opportunity for students to use the vocabulary in context and allow for the teacher to assess understanding.

While traditionally the term biome is reserved for only terrestrial environments. This project is also design to allow students to explore aquatic environments.

Before beginning this project your students should become familiar with these vocabulary terms: biome, climate, food web, producer, primary consumer, secondary consumer, top predator, herbivore, omnivore, carnivore, decomposer, detritivore, and keystone species.

This project meets the following Next generation science standards (NGSS).
“LS2.A: Interdependent Relationships in Ecosystems: Similarly, predatory interactions may reduce the number of organisms or eliminate whole populations of organisms. Mutually beneficial interactions, in contrast, may become so interdependent that each organism requires the other for survival. Although the species involved in these competitive, predatory, and mutually beneficial interactions vary across ecosystems, the patterns of interactions of organisms with their environments, both living and nonliving, are shared. (MS-LS2-2)
LS2.B: Cycle of Matter and Energy Transfer in Ecosystems: Food webs are models that demonstrate how matter and energy is transferred between producers, consumers, and decomposers as the three groups interact within an ecosystem. Transfers of matter into and out of the physical environment occur at every level. Decomposers recycle nutrients from dead plant or animal matter back to the soil in terrestrial environments or to the water in aquatic environments. The atoms that make up the organisms in an ecosystem are cycled repeatedly between the living and nonliving parts of the ecosystem. (MS-LS2-3)” (NGSS Lead States, 2013)

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