Living And Non-living Things Are Everywhere (2nd Ed, 1987)

have you ever thought about what you have in common with elephants what about these fish or this flower of course you're nothing like this parami or are you well let's think about [Music] it even though we all look a whole lot different than these giraffes or these caterpillars believe it or not we share many common characteristics do you know what they are we all reproduce we move on our own we grow we need nourishment we respond to our environment and we all age and die there's one more Bond all living things share we are all members of a community a living community whose members come in every side size shape and color a community of Life the Earth's Community home to all living things when was the last time you went on an adventure to explore the world around you let's join one that's about to begin right now grass that you're sitting on is alive right and the trees behind us are alive but what do all these things have in common I mean how do we know that they're alive compared to a rock which isn't alive CA can you tell me uh some qualities of living things well usually living things move and but like a little seed it has to be moved by the wind or a river could move it well things have to grow like when the baby's born you had to support its neck and when it gets a little older it crawls and you don't have to help it and when it gets a little older it can walk run on its own do a lot of things on its own how about you Eric well an animal has to breathe air anything that's alive has to breathe air trees breathe air yeah through their mouth through their leaves their leaves okay one thing that living things do is reproduce like a mother giving birth to a baby that's a form of reproducing Anthony what else can you tell us about living things well living things have to eat food to have energy so that they can move and they and they need food so that they can reproduce too if something lives it has to die doesn't matter how old they live like turtles and trees can live more than 200 years old and what happens to living things when they die usually other animals come and eat them okay you all seem to have a pretty good idea of what's a and what is it now I'd like you to do what your goal today is is to go out and explore this Nature Center and its grounds and to find examples of what's living and what isn't now if you can bring examples of these things back to the Nature Center and if you can't make a note in your notebook about what you saw or what it is exactly that you wanted to tell us about when we get together again now let's look team one I'd like to go over to the farm and see what you can find over there team two you folks get the river and the forest and don't be afraid to roll over a dead log or reach your hand in the water and pick up a rock and team three you'll get to stay right here in the meow and explore the Deep grass and maybe bring back some insects for me okay let's meet back in the Nature Center in about 1 hour and I look forward to seeing what you find in your adventure let's join each team as they carry out their mission what kind of living and non-living things do you think they'll find he n [Music] n [Music] welcome back it looks like you found a lot of interesting examples of living and non-living things on your exploration team one what did you find out the farm well I found I found these um rocks and it's really called gravel but they don't have any needs they don't need any because it doesn't move and it doesn't need any food F so they're not alive right they're not alive and um I got these wild flowers and they're getting kind of wilted so I'm going to plant them back pretty soon which way are you going to plant those this way ah have Roots down there mhm good what about you Amy well at the farm we could feed the cows and sheep and well you just fed the cows by [Music] hand but with the Sheep you shook a bucket which had the corn inside and they' come running up to you and if you didn't feed them fast they would wrap the bucket away from you and just start eating it all so the Sheep when they heard the sound of the Corn they came running knowing that there would be food their house they responded in a way to the noise can you show us some of that corn corn is alive but when you they just crushed it just use it for Animals now we found this nest in the barn and you know it was hooked on to the side because the side is all flat oh stuck on too mhm so the birds sort of used the barn or needed the barn in order to make a home shelter well looks like you found a lot of interesting things at the farm team two what did you find in the forest and by the river we found this moss growing on the tree all right how did you know the Moss was alive because it had this color and it looked like it was growing so it was fresh and green then very green and fresh and we saw red tailed Haw and it had a snake in its hand oh it did well rather it's claw right his Talons okay what was it doing with the snake it was probably going to eat it you think so yeah so that Haw needed the snake yeah okay Joshua what did you find well I found some soil and um I know the soil is not alive but the little things in it are alive oh neat like these little Roots the those roots depend on the little bugs that live in there right you saw some bugs in the soil okay great I see you have a spider in the jar here oh yeah but that spider on the tree or in the soil it was inside the a dead log oh it was inside a dead log the log was Hollow yeah so that made a nice home for the the good job team two team three what did you find in the middle we saw a baby red [Music] fox and we we found some wild flowers how could you tell those flowers were alive they were on what looks like a live Bush green and a brown wi well we we were chasing a butterfly was it alive or how could you tell was a butterfly not just a leaf or something blowing in the wind cuz I saw both of his wings flapping oh I saw the wings flapping yeah we also found this feather from a bird at the edge of the forest at the edge of the forest did you see any non-living things in that field was the sun shiny yeah the sun was shiny okay well is sunlight living yeah you think so does it reproduce no no oh I thought thought you told me that reproduction was part of living well you don't have to reproduce you don't have to reproduce well if something chose not to reproduce how long could it go on living not very long no not long at all so I really don't think they have too much of a choice if they're going to exist they better reproduce well we've all enjoyed sharing these things that we found today before we put them back this might be a good time to get up and take a closer look at what we found and what else is in this room their Adventure is coming to an end but yours is just beginning there are all kinds of living and non-living things waiting to be discovered and a good place to start is in your own backyard who knows an owl like this may live in a tree right outside your home [Music]