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The Role of Consumers in Food Chains — Reading Comprehension

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This engaging and audio-integrated reading passage, 'The Role of Consumers in Food Chains,' is designed for 5th-grade students to understand how living things interact within their environment. It explores essential concepts like producers, consumers, and decomposers, explaining their roles in the movement of matter and energy. Aligned with NGSS 5-LS2-1, this passage helps students develop a model to describe the movement of matter among plants, animals, decomposers, and the environment. Through simple language and clear definitions, students will learn about different types of consumers and their importance in maintaining healthy ecosystems. The passage also includes activities to reinforce comprehension.

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Wide food chain illustration showing energy flow from sun to decomposers in nature. Image caption: Food chain: sun to producers, consumers, and decomposers in a vibrant ecosystem. — Food chain: sun to producers, consumers, and decomposers in a vibrant ecosystem.

What Are Consumers?

In every ecosystem, living things depend on each other for food and energy. Animals that eat plants or other animals are called consumers. They play a big part in moving energy from plants to animals, helping nature stay balanced.

The Three Levels of Consumers

There are three main levels of consumers in a food chain. The first level is primary consumers. These are animals that eat only plants, like rabbits, grasshoppers, and deer. They are also called herbivores. Primary consumers are important because they help keep plant populations under control.

The second level is secondary consumers. These animals eat primary consumers. They are often small predators, such as frogs, small birds, and snakes. Secondary consumers help manage the number of herbivores in an ecosystem.

The third level is tertiary consumers, also called top predators. They eat secondary consumers. Examples include hawks, wolves, and sharks. Tertiary consumers keep everything below them in balance, making sure no group becomes too large.

The Energy Pyramid

Energy moves through a food chain like a basketball being passed up the court. Plants make energy from sunlight. Primary consumers eat the plants and get some of their energy. Secondary consumers then eat primary consumers, and so on. But only about 10% of the energy moves up to each new level. That’s why there are many more rabbits than wolves; there simply isn’t enough energy to support many top predators. The energy pyramid is wide at the bottom (lots of producers), and narrow at the top (few top predators).

Food Chains, Food Webs, and Decomposers

A food chain shows a simple path of energy: grass → rabbit → fox. But in real ecosystems, food webs show many connected chains because animals often eat more than one kind of food. There is also a special kind of consumer called a decomposer. Decomposers, like fungi and bacteria, eat dead plants and animals. They recycle nutrients back to producers, so the cycle can start again.

If there were no consumers, plants would overgrow, dead things would pile up, and the ecosystem would not work. Every part is important for balance!

Interesting Fact: A single hawk may need to eat hundreds of mice each year to survive because so little energy reaches the top of the food chain!

What do consumers eat?

Plants or other animalsOnly sunlightOnly waterOnly rocks

Who are primary consumers?

Animals that eat plantsTop predatorsFungi and bacteriaAnimals that eat only meat

What do decomposers do?

Eat dead things and recycle nutrientsMake energy from sunlightEat only plantsHunt other animals

Why are there fewer wolves than rabbits?

Less energy at higher levelsWolves eat grassRabbits are top predatorsWolves are decomposers

What would happen without consumers?

Plants would overgrowEnergy would increaseEcosystem would work betterMore top predators