Virginia SOL LS.6.b
The Standard
the availability and use of resources may lead to competition and cooperation
Virginia Standards of Learning for Science · The student will investigate and understand that populations in a biological community interact and are interdependent. Key ideas include
Teacher's field guide
What This Standard Means
What Students Need to Do
- Students identify food, water, light, space, shelter, and mates as resources organisms need. They explain how changes in supply can cause organisms to compete or work together, using evidence from a scenario or investigation.
What Mastery Looks Like
- Given a scenario, students name the limited resource and the populations involved. They predict competition or cooperation and explain how the interaction affects access to that resource.
Common Misconceptions
- Students may think only different species compete, but members of the same population often compete too. They may count only food as a resource and overlook water, light, space, shelter, or mates. They may treat cooperation as friendship or assume it removes all competition.
How to Assess It
- Exit ticket: A winter decline leaves few deer for two wolf packs. Name the limited resource, explain how the packs may compete, and explain how wolves within one pack may cooperate.
Lesson moves
Ways to Teach It
Give groups spoons and cups to collect 30 beans, then cut the bean supply in half and graph each group’s results.
Write: When water becomes scarce at a shared watering hole, how might animals compete, and how might members of one herd cooperate?
Play a resource-card game where species claim food, water, and shelter, earning a survival point when sharing or group hunting improves access.
Use local bird-feeder observations to identify which birds compete for seed and which behaviors help flock members locate or defend food.
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Printable LS.6.b Worksheet
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