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Is It an Animal?
How can you make observations and collect evidence to classify animals?

Background
Phenomenon Sometimes it is difficult to decide if a living thing is an animal. All organisms have
characteristics that allow us to classify them as animals or other living things. How can you
design a procedure to classify different organisms as animals or not?

Materials (per group)

• cricket • pill bug
• earthworm • potted plant
• fern • sponges
• minnow

Safety
Be sure to follow all safety procedures provided by your teacher. The Safety Appendix of your
textbook provides more details about the safety icons.

Design a Procedure
 1 Make a list of 3-5 different animals.
.

 2 What are some things that make these animals different from one another?
.

 3 Use your materials to design a procedure for how you can classify organisms as
. animals or not.

 4 Show your plan to your teacher before you begin. Record your observations and data.
.

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Observations

Analyze and Interpret

1 SEP Analyze Which organisms are animals and which are not? Use your observations to
. support your reasoning.

2 SEP Use Evidence Look at the observations you recorded about each organism. What
. evidence did you use to classify the animals? What characteristics do all animals share?

3 SEP Construct Explanations Are all living things considered animals? Are all animals
. considered living things? Explain your answer.

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