If you had 10 minutes to buy milk
and chips in a new grocery store,
would you know where to look?
 If
the store has things
classified, it makes it easier
and faster to locate items
*Classification is Everywhere
Grocery stores classify items by type
baking items, dairy items, frozen food,
Post offices classify mail by destination
zip code, then street, then house number
Schools classify students by traits
grade number, gender, academic ability
*items in green should be written down
*Classification gives clues
Scientists have identified more than 2
million species of organisms here on Earth
 Scientists group organisms based on
similarities
 When organisms are arranged in groups,
they are easier to study
 Classifying organisms into groups is called
Taxonomy

What is a cassowary?
What does a cassowary look like?
What does a cassowary eat?
How big is a cassowary?
If you know that a cassowary is
classified as a bird, you also know
that…
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It has wings
It has feathers
It has hollow bones
It has a beak
It is probably an
omnivore
It can be seen using
only the eyes
Classification clues us in
*Scientists classify based on
STRUCTURE
The basic structure of
an organisms doesn’t
change.
 What would happen if
we classified
organisms based on
color?
 A zebra and a zebra
fish would be cousins!

Aristotle had 2 kingdoms
Plants
 Don’t Move
 Green
Animals
 Move around
After Careful observation…
Fungi didn’t fit…
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Can grow in the dark
Spring up overnight
Need dead things to
grow on
So we created a
3rd kingdom for
Fungi
A sampling of fungi
MOLD
YEAST
More examples of fungi
TRUFFLES
MUSHROOMS
This 3-kingdom system
lasted for several hundred
years

Until microscope
technology allowed
us to see smaller
organisms
Most of what they saw in the
microscope wouldn't fit into
these three kingdoms

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They could move like
animals, but had only
one cell
They didn’t have to
“mate” to reproduce
Paramecium
So scientists created a fourth
kingdom called Protista
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Single celled
Live in water or very
moist environments
Most can move
Some are
photosynthetic
Many are parasites
A sampling of protists
EUGLENA
GIARDIA
More protists
ALGAE
AMOEBA
These 4 kingdoms were the only ones
for a few years until microscopes
improved, and we could see inside
single cells
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We noticed differences
in nuclei
Some organisms
didn’t have a nucleus
at all – only a single
chromosome floating
in the cytoplasm
A sampling of Monerans
STREP BACTERIA
STAPH BACTERIA
More Monerans
E. COLI BACTERIA
MENINGIOCOCCAL
BACTERIA
Even more Monerans
SLEEPING
SICKNESS
PNEUMONIA
Currently we have 5 kingdoms
 Animalia
 Plantae
 Fungi
 Protista
 Monera
Many scientists want to
divide the moneran
kingdom and make a
6th kingdom because
bacteria can be very
different.
Archaebacteria – weird
Eubacteria – normal
Some scientists even want to
create a 7th kingdom for viruses

Viruses aren’t
technically alive
because they can’t
live without a host
A sampling of viruses
EBOLA
INFLUENZA
More Viruses
COLD
H.I.V
The better our technology
becomes, the more we know
about organisms
We have a system for describing
exactly where things fit…..
TAXONOMY
Just like when you send a letter to Portugal,
first you specify the country, then the city,
then the street, then the building, then
the floor number, then left or right, then
the room number. Otherwise it would be
impossible to find people.
To locate a living thing…
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Kingdom
Phylum
Class
Order
Family
Genus
Species
Let's make this easy to
remember.
Once upon a time, in a kingdom far, far
away, there lived a prince named Phillip…
Carollus Linneaus
The moral of the story is…
Linneaus wrote in the margin of his notebook…
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King
Phil
Came
Over
For
Gun
Shot
And you will forever remember

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King
Phil
Came
Over
For
Gun
Shot
Kingdom
Phylum
Class
Order
Family
Genus
Species
So how do we know where to
put things in the
classification scheme?

Remember, living things are classified on
similarities in structure.
First, start with the kingdom

A Snowy Owl belongs to the animal
kingdom because
 it can move
 it is made of more than one cell
 it has to eat
Then, decide on the Phylum

A Snowy Owl belongs to the Chordata
Phylum because
 It has a spinal cord
 It has bones
Then decide on the Order

A Snowy Owl belongs to the Order
Strigiformes because
 It is a carnivore
 It has large, sharp talons
Then decide on the Family

A snowy owl belongs to the family
Stringidae because
It has a hooked beak
 It has a round face
 It hunts at night
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Then decide on the genus,
A Snowy Owl belongs to the genus Bubo
because
It lives in the Northern Hemisphere
It has a fourth talon
Then decide on the species
A Snowy Owl belongs to the scandiacus
species because
 It is white
 It weighs about 40 grams
 It has dense downy feathers
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The more classification
levels that are shared by two
organisms, the more alike
they are.
A snowy owl is more like a barn owl than an
earthworm.
If they are in the same species,
they can breed and produce
offspring that can also
reproduce.
Scientific name =
Genus species
Example: Homo sapiens = humans
Which of these are most
closely related?
A Felis familiaris
B Canis familiaris
C Canis lupus