Habitats and Niches in an Ecosystem

Objectives:

• Students will be able to explain what a habitat and a niche are.

• Students will be able to distinguish between habitats and niches.

• Students will be able to explain what a population is.

• Students will be able to describe how changes in an ecosystem can affect the ecosystem and its populations.

• Students will understand that people sometimes interfere with ecosystems.

Suggested Grades:

4th Grade - 5th Grade - 6th Grade

Lesson Procedure:

Print the reading comprehension worksheet passage and questions (see below).

Students should read the passage silently, then answer the questions. Teachers may also use the text as part of a classroom lesson plan.

Lesson Excerpt:

There are a number of habitats and niches in every ecosystem. Habitats are places where animals and other organisms live. For example, a badger’s habitat is a hole in the ground. A frog’s habitat may be a pond or a stream. A niche is the particular activity of a species within the ecosystem. What an animal eats, what it needs to survive and whether it is active during the day or at night are all examples of niches. The frog’s niche includes not only the pond where it lives, but also the insects it eats, the time of day that it hunts for food and the semi-tropical climate that create its ideal living conditions.

A group of living things that exist in a certain area is known as a population. Every population has a unique niche.

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