Trophic Level Teacher Resources

Learn more about food chains, the food web, and the concepts relating to them. It focuses on consumers, producers, decomposers, energy transfer, and energy loss across trophic levels.

A set of guided notes walks your biology or environmental studies learners through the dynamics of ecosystems. They write short answers to questions about the energy budget, food webs, trophic levels, and biogeochemical cycles. One way...

All of the species in our world are part of what is called a trophic level. Basically, it determines an organism's position in the food chain. Introduce your learners to the basic levels and have them identify more organisms that could...

Middle or high school environmental studies classes will learn much from this presentation on energy in ecosystems. It covers the foundational topics of trophic levels, food webs, and nutrient cycles using informational text and...

The bulk of this lesson involves the construction of both an aquatic and a terrestrial ecosystem in which to observe trophic relationships. Detailed directions are provided, as well as discussion questions, and assessment activities....

students analyze the place of humans among the tropic levels by observing what we eat. They calculate the caloric content of several foods commonly eaten by humans and calculate the total energy cost to grow, process, transport, store...

Chart ecological community interactions and answer questions about niche, defenses, trophic structure, and succession. This community ecology activity provides a general overview of the interactions that occur among organisms that share...

The reintroduction of a species to an area doesn't always go as expected. Scholars learn about the reintroduction of wolves into Yellowstone National Park with a video, reading, and discussion questions. They complete a hands-on activity...

Students become familiar with the temperate rainforest.  In this forest ecosystem lesson, students identify the producers, consumers and decomposers in the forest ecosystem.  Students sort cards and identify the trophic level...

Tenth graders participate in the "Checks and Balances" game. This game lets them experience the interdependence of oragnisms specific to the Great Salt Lake. They recieved informaton about food chains, food webs, trophic levels various...

Psychologists study human relationships while ecologist study relationships between organisms in the environment. An introduction to ecology and the related vocabulary benefits scholars as they progress through the presentation and...

Who eats who in the savannas of Africa? Explore trophic levels with part four of an eight-part series of lessons focused around Gorongosa National Park. After young explorers identify animals using trailcam images, they construct a food...

Our relationship with toxins is, well, a little toxic. Explore how harmful substances work their way throughout the environment with a video from an expansive biology playlist. Topics include DDT and mercury, trophic levels, and water...

This exam touches upon every topic within the typical first year biology course.. A broad variety of question styles give high schoolers every opportunity to show what they know. Why start from scratch when a comprehensive final exam is...

If you need a few basic activities for teaching food chains to your emerging ecologists, here they are. Three sheets of organism cards are included for learners to cut out and arrange according to trophic relationships. To make the most...

In the ecological game of who eats who, one small change can have a big impact! Individuals create food chains in an array of ecosystems, then determine what happens to organisms in the chain when one organism changes its feeding...

Middle schoolers explore the differnences between food producers in food webs and food consumers in food chains. Behavioral choices of primary and secondary consumers such as herbivores, vegetarians, carnivors, and omnivors are analyzed.

Piecing together the past is a challenging endeavor. Learners get a taste of that challenge as they play a game that incorporates several components such as trophic levels, geological time periods, and catastrophic events. Pairs work to...

Students analyze the trophic level of humans by first calculating the kilocalories in own their lunch. They then calulate the kilocalories in a wide variety of foods found in grocery stores and compare the kilocalories needed to acquire...

Students use an interactive web-based food web game to gain familiarity with tropic levels and interactions. They already understand that in an ecosystem there are four basic tropic levels: producers, primary consumers, secondary...

Students recognize interdependence in a food web by using yarn and notecards to create a food web and discussing what would happen if one of the organisms from a certain trophic level is removed.

In this energy cycle worksheet, students will write in examples for each trophic level in an energy cycle: top, middle, and lowest levels.

Students apply the ecological pyramids of numbers and biomass with an activity using topographic maps. In this trophic level lesson, students work in groups using a topographic map to determine the number of organisms that can live in an...