School › Biodiversity › Ages 6–7
So many kinds of life!
Biodiversity means all the different kinds of living things. Find out how many kinds there are, why we need them, and count the different leaves near your school.
Read
Biodiversity is a big word for all the different kinds of living things on Earth.[1]
Scientists have named more than a million and a half kinds of living things. Most of them are insects![1][2]
There are many more kinds that nobody has found or named yet.[1]
We need biodiversity. Living things give us food, clean air, drinking water and things like medicines, clothes and paper.[2]
Living things need each other too. That is why it matters when a kind of plant or animal starts to disappear.[2]
We can help by looking after the places where plants and animals live.[1][2]
Try it: How many kinds of leaves?
You need
- Two paper bags
- Gloves
- A large sheet of paper for each group
- Pencil
Safety
An adult checks the area first. Wear gloves, only pick up fallen leaves, do not pick berries, mushrooms or nettles, never put anything in your mouth, and wash your hands afterwards.
What to do
- Go outside with your teacher to two places: a mown lawn and a hedge or a wild corner.
- In each place, collect fallen leaves from the ground (only from the ground!). Put them in a bag.
- Back in class, tip out the leaves from the first bag. Put leaves that look the same in one pile.
- Count the piles: how many different kinds of leaves did you find?
- Do the same with the second bag.
- Which place had more kinds of leaves? That place has more biodiversity.
What happens, and why?
Each pile is a different kind of plant. The more different kinds you find in a place, the more biodiversity it has. Scientists call the number of different kinds in a place the 'species richness'.[1]
Play: What does nature give us?
Where does this come from? Tap the group it belongs to.
Your best score is kept only on this device. Nothing is sent anywhere.
Quiz
Other ages: Ages 10–11 · Ages 15–16