What Is a Life Cycle?
A life cycle simply means
the stages of life.
For example, a human life
cycle would look like this:
Baby
Child
Adolescent
Elderly
Adult
Do All Animals Have the
Same Life Cycle?
Not all animals go through the same changes throughout their life
cycle, but most animals go through what’s called the simple life cycle.
The simple life cycle has just three steps!
• They are born (birthed or hatched).
• They are young.
• They are adults
Chicken Life Cycle
A chicken goes through a
simple life cycle:
Egg
Chick
Chicken
Metamorphosis
Metamorphosis means that an animal goes through a very
big change in their life cycle. They look completely different
when they are born to how they look when they are adults!
Most animals that go through metamorphosis are
amphibians and insects.
Do you know of an animal that goes
through metamorphosis?
Amphibians
Amphibians go through more steps in their life cycle than a chicken does.
For example, the life cycle of a frog has 5 steps!
Eggs
Frog
Tadpole
Froglet
Tadpole with legs
Insects
Just like amphibians, insects go through more than 3 steps in their life
cycle too. Let’s take a beetle for example.
Eggs
Larva
Pupa
Young Beetle
Adult Beetle
Life Cycle
Think of your favourite animal. Can you guess its life cycle?