Lesson 5: Carrying Capacity and Limiting Factors
Duration of Days: 4
Lesson Objective
Analyze how limiting factors and habitat fragmentation affect the carrying capacity of an ecosystem for specific species.
What stops a population from growing forever? How do abiotic factors like dissolved oxygen act as a ceiling for life?
HS-LS2-1 (Factors affecting carrying capacity).
Interpreting graphs (J-curves vs. S-curves).
Students analyze population graphs of North Atlantic Cod to determine the point of overfishing and identify which factors (food, space, or oxygen) were the primary limiters.
(DOK 4)
See "Materials / Resources / Text / Speakers" field
Students draw an S-curve on a blank graph and mark the carrying capacity line. They must write a caption explaining how a sudden abiotic change (like a temperature spike) would lower that carrying capacity line.
MPS DIFFERENTIATION STRATEGIES
text, articles, computer