Texas TEKS 3.12.B
The Standard
identify and describe the flow of energy in a food chain and predict how changes in a food chain such as removal of frogs from a pond or bees from a field affect the ecosystem
Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for Science
Teacher's field guide
What This Standard Means
What Students Need to Do
- Students trace energy from the Sun to plants and then to animals. They explain how losing one organism can change food supplies and populations elsewhere in the chain.
What Mastery Looks Like
- Students correctly arrange organisms in feeding order and draw arrows showing where energy goes. They predict at least two effects of removing an organism and support each prediction with evidence from the chain.
Common Misconceptions
- Students often point arrows toward what gets eaten instead of toward the organism receiving energy. They may think removing one species affects only its predator, or that all other populations decrease.
How to Assess It
- Give students the chain algae → insect → frog → heron. Ask them to predict two changes if frogs disappear and explain each one.
Lesson moves
Ways to Teach It
Give groups organism cards and yarn, then have them build a pond food chain and remove one card to track the effects.
Ask students to write: What might happen in a field if bees disappeared, and which organisms would be affected next?
Play Food Chain Fix-It by showing mixed-up organism cards and having teams race to order them and place energy arrows correctly.
Observe a schoolyard plant and nearby animals, then sketch a possible food chain and predict what would happen if one organism vanished.
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Printable 3.12.B Worksheet
A ready-to-print activity worksheet aligned to 3.12.B, with an answer key for the teacher on its own page. No account needed.
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Related Standards
- 1.12.C
identify and illustrate how living organisms depend on each other through food chains.
- 4.12.B
describe the cycling of matter and flow of energy through food webs, including the roles of the Sun, producers, consumers, and decomposers; and
- 2.12.B
create and describe food chains identifying producers and consumers to demonstrate how animals depend on other living things; and
- 5.12.B
predict how changes in the ecosystem affect the cycling of matter and flow of energy in a food web; and
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