This one-page check for 4th grade covers the main food chain ideas in four tasks. Students write producer, consumer or decomposer under pictures of an oak tree, a deer and a mushroom, put owl, grass, snake and mouse into a chain with arrows, and sort a cow, a wolf and a raccoon by diet. A last question asks why a food chain begins with a plant. The key is on page 2.
“Identify a producer, a consumer and a decomposer from pictures.”
Item 1 uses an oak tree, a deer and a mushroom.
“Order a food chain and use arrows to show where the energy goes.”
Item 2 asks for owl, grass, snake and mouse in order.
“Classify animals as herbivores, carnivores or omnivores.”
Item 3 uses a cow, a wolf and a raccoon.
“Explain why a food chain begins with a plant.”
Item 4.
Photos of an oak tree, a deer and a mushroom, each with an empty box below for producer, consumer or decomposer.
Four living things in mixed order, owl, grass, snake and mouse, to write in one long box with arrows between them.
A three-column table headed herbivore, carnivore and omnivore, with a short definition in each heading. Students place a cow, a wolf and a raccoon.
One short answer with three lines: why does a food chain begin with a plant?
The three labels, the chain grass to mouse to snake to owl, the completed diet table and a model answer to the last question.
Exit ticket
Hand it out in the last ten minutes of a food chain unit. Four tasks on one page show quickly who can order a chain and who still mixes up consumer and decomposer.
Before and after
Give the same page at the start and the end of the unit. The tasks are the same, so the change in answers is easy to see.
Mark item 2 first
A chain with the arrows reversed tells you the class needs another look at which way energy moves.
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