TEACHGYAN • CLASS 6 SCIENCE • CURIOSITY
Chapter 10 – Living Creatures: Exploring their Characteristics
Living & non-living • Life processes • Movement • Growth • Nutrition • Respiration • Response • Reproduction • Habitats • MCQs • Worksheet
Chapter focus: Living organisms show a collection of characteristics and life processes. Movement alone is not enough to decide whether something is living; organisms obtain energy, grow, respond, reproduce and carry out other life processes.
🎯 Learning Goals
- Distinguish living and non-living things using multiple characteristics.
- Understand movement as a characteristic of living organisms.
- Explain growth, nutrition and respiration.
- Recognise response to stimuli.
- Understand reproduction and excretion at an introductory level.
- Relate organisms to their habitats.
- Use observation and evidence rather than a single feature to classify living things.
🌱 1. Living and Non-Living
A living organism carries out life processes. A stone does not eat, respire, grow biologically, reproduce or respond as an organism does. A parked animal may show little visible movement but can still be alive and carrying out internal life processes.
🏃 2. Movement
Living organisms show movement in one form or another. Animals may move from place to place, while plants show movements such as growth of shoots towards light. Internal movements and movements of body parts may also occur.
📈 3. Growth
Living organisms grow through biological processes. A seedling can increase in size and develop new structures. Growth in living organisms involves changes in cells and tissues, unlike an object merely becoming larger because material is added from outside.
🍎 4. Nutrition
Organisms need nutrients and energy. Green plants make food through photosynthesis using light energy, carbon dioxide and water, while animals obtain food by consuming other organisms or their products.
🫁 5. Respiration
Respiration is a cellular process that releases usable energy from food. It is not simply the same as breathing. Animals breathe to exchange gases, while respiration occurs in cells. Plants also respire.
💡 6. Response to Stimuli
Living organisms sense and respond to changes in their surroundings. A person withdraws a hand from a hot object, and a plant shoot may grow towards light. Such changes are called responses to stimuli.
👶 7. Reproduction
Reproduction is the process by which organisms produce new individuals of their kind. Different organisms reproduce in different ways. Reproduction is important for continuation of species, although an individual organism does not need to reproduce to remain alive.
🚮 8. Excretion
Life processes produce waste materials. Organisms have ways of removing or managing these wastes. In humans, for example, carbon dioxide is removed through breathing and certain wastes are removed through urine.
🏞️ 9. Habitats
A habitat is the natural place where an organism lives and obtains the conditions it needs. Organisms show adaptations that help them survive in their habitats. Aquatic organisms and terrestrial organisms experience different environmental conditions.
🐌 10. Observation Activity
- Observe a plant, an insect or another safe living organism.
- Record evidence of movement, growth, nutrition, respiration or response where observable.
- Compare the organism with a non-living object.
- Discuss which characteristics are directly observable and which require indirect evidence.
📋 Worked Examples
Example 1 – A Moving Fan
A fan blade moves, but movement alone does not make the fan a living organism. It does not carry out biological life processes such as nutrition, respiration and reproduction.
Example 2 – A Sleeping Dog
A sleeping dog may appear still, but it continues to breathe, respire, maintain body functions and respond to its environment.
Example 3 – A Plant
A plant does not walk from place to place, but it grows, makes food, respires and responds to light and other environmental changes.
🧠 Think Like a Scientist
- Why is movement alone not enough to identify a living organism?
- How can a plant show movement without walking?
- Why is breathing not exactly the same as respiration?
- Why can a sleeping animal still be considered alive?
- What evidence would you collect before deciding whether an unfamiliar object is living?
📝 Important Practice Questions
- What is a living organism?
- List five characteristics of living organisms.
- Why is movement considered a characteristic of life?
- How do plants show movement?
- What is nutrition?
- What is respiration?
- What is a stimulus?
- What is reproduction?
- What is excretion?
- What is a habitat?
🔥 Competency / HOTS
- A car moves and a dog moves. Give evidence showing why one is living and the other is not.
- A seed appears inactive. How could you investigate whether it is living?
- Explain why a plant needs both nutrition and respiration.
- Design an observation to show that a plant responds to light.
- Why should scientists use several characteristics rather than one characteristic when identifying living things?
🧩 MCQ Practice
- Which is a characteristic of living organisms? A. growth B. rusting only C. breaking D. melting
- A plant responds to — A. stimuli such as light B. nothing C. only sound D. only magnets
- Plants obtain energy-rich food mainly through — A. photosynthesis B. filtration C. sieving D. evaporation
- Respiration mainly helps cells — A. release usable energy from food B. measure length C. separate mixtures D. make magnets
- Production of new individuals is called — A. reproduction B. filtration C. condensation D. measurement
- Removal of metabolic wastes is associated with — A. excretion B. melting C. winnowing D. freezing
- The natural place where an organism lives is its — A. habitat B. thermometer C. mixture D. magnet
- A sleeping animal is — A. still living B. non-living because it is still C. a machine D. a mineral
Answer Key: 1-A, 2-A, 3-A, 4-A, 5-A, 6-A, 7-A, 8-A
📄 Printable Worksheet
- List seven characteristics of living organisms.
- Explain why movement alone is not enough to identify life.
- Give two examples of plant responses.
- Differentiate breathing and respiration at a basic level.
- Explain nutrition in plants and animals.
- What is reproduction and why is it important for a species?
- Explain excretion with one human example.
- Define habitat and give two examples.
- Compare a living plant with a non-living object using five characteristics.
- Design an observation activity for a living organism.
🔁 Quick Revision
| Characteristic | Remember |
|---|---|
| Movement | Living organisms show movement in various forms. |
| Growth | Biological increase and development. |
| Nutrition | Obtaining or making food and nutrients. |
| Respiration | Cellular release of usable energy from food. |
| Response | Reaction to stimuli in the environment. |
| Reproduction | Production of new individuals. |
| Excretion | Removal/management of metabolic wastes. |
| Habitat | Natural place and conditions in which an organism lives. |
✅ Mastery Checklist
- ☐ I can distinguish living and non-living using evidence.
- ☐ I can list characteristics of living organisms.
- ☐ I can explain nutrition and respiration.
- ☐ I can explain response to stimuli.
- ☐ I understand reproduction and excretion.
- ☐ I can explain habitat and adaptation at a basic level.