Lesson 4. Organization and Carrying Capacity
Estimated Time: 1 period
Objective
Define carrying capacity and relate it to ecosystem organization
EQ: How is carrying capacity related to ecosystem organization?
Bridge
List the organization of an individual organism from smallest to largest, starting with an
organelle.
Mini Lesson
Share out bridge
Introduce the debate: this will include handing out the rubric they will be judged on as well as
the grading rubric. The purpose of the debate is to convince your audience that your impact is
greater on the planet than the other 3 impacts that are in the debate. Each group will represent a
debate team and each member will be responsible for speaking during the debate so it may be in
their best interests while preparing that each of them becomes an expert on an aspect of their
impact as well as the other teams impacts. During the debate, they will be able to decide the
order they will go on depending on what the other team says, but they will definitely need to
assign an opening speaker and a closing speaker: if the order changes it should be in the middle
ranks.
Go on to carrying capacity:
There is more than just an organism in the world or even more than just one kind of that one
organism. We started the year looking at how life went from nothing to an organized system
within a species. So what does this organization look like after that?
A collection of all the same species in an environment is called a population. When we take in
all the populations in the area we call that a community (all the biotic factors in an area). But
living things are not the only things around us, there are abiotic factors as well. When we add in
all those abiotic factors like water, rocks, temperature, weather, etc that surround us, we refer to
that as our environment. If we take our environment, and all the surrounding environments that
share the same types of abiotic and biotic factors, we call that an ecosystem. For example, we
live in Rochester, and that is our environment. If we take into account the weather and climate,
the types of organisms that surround us, and all other factors we live in a temperate forest
ecosystem. All of the temperate forest ecosystems on earth make up a temperate forest biome.
There are many ecosystems and each of these ecosystems has similar characteristics that they
share to classify it that way: tropical rainforests, tundra, deserts, grasslands, etc. All are found at
similar latitudes, share similar rainfall, share organisms that have evolved in a similar manner
even though they live in different parts of the world, because our environments drive natural
selection.
The availability or resources in these areas has determined how organisms would evolve. They
will have specific structures to help them survive their climates. They will have specific
behaviors that help them deal with competition for these resources. They will have developed
predator/prey relationships or parasite/host relationships, or relationships in which they work
together to survive in their environment. How successful their adaptations are combined with
the amount of limited resources available will determine each species’ carrying capacity.
Carrying capacity is the maximum number of organisms that an ecosystem can support with the
resources that are available. When a population is below carrying capacity, they will continue to
reproduce until they have gone over. If a population is over the carrying capacity, individuals
will start to die off because there are not enough resources for all of them. This is usually
expressed as a graphic relationship:
or
Work Period
Each one of your human impact topics greatly impacts the carrying capacities of ecosystems all
over the world. Work on your debate topics, making sure to include the concept of carrying
capacity into your debate.
Summary
Answer the EQ
Closing
How does your human impact relate to carrying capacity?
SPED and ELL Modifications:
1. Visual cue for Bridge activity- only provide when students have reached frustration level:
2. Show short video on carrying capacity listed below.
3. Encourage students to complete one of the tutorials on carrying capacity below
Apps and Internet Activities:
1. World Population Clock: a great piece to add to the Smart Lesson so as you are teaching they
can watch it increase every moment:
http://www.ibiblio.org/lunarbin/worldpop
2. Short video on carrying capacity:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jy2u51PYTUg
3. Interactive lab on carrying capacity:
http://geosim.cs.vt.edu/Java/IntlPop/IntlPop.html
(the additional worksheet to accompany this activity can be found
http://www.nclark.net/Populations)
4. Additional activities on carrying capacity:
a) http://www.gov.mb.ca/conservation/sustain/carcap.pdf
b) http://verderbz.com/files/PopulationLab1.pdf
Independent Practice
Regents questions on carrying capacity