Year 8 Science · Unit 1 · Lesson 5
Foundation Worksheet
Learning Goals
Fill the gap
Choose the correct word from the word bank. Two words will not be used.
A root’s structure helps it the plant and absorb water. The heart’s muscular walls help it blood. A leaf is thin and flat, so it can take in plenty of . A strong answer says what a part is, what it , and how it other parts.
Put the wombat’s levels in order
Rank the rows from 1 for the tiniest part to 5 for the whole animal, then name each level.
| Rank (1–5) | Part of a wombat | Level |
|---|---|---|
| The skeletal system | ||
| One bone cell | ||
| The whole wombat | ||
| Bone tissue | ||
| The thigh bone |
1. Complete: an organ system is a group of ________ working together. Name one found in a wattle and one found in a wombat.
Sort it
Write each item in the correct box. Every item has exactly one correct box. The boxes do not all get the same number of items.
Plants only
Animals only
Both plants and animals
2. Look at your “Both” box. Use it to explain why “animals have systems but plants only have parts” is wrong.
Read the data
Investigation: onion cells and cheek cells
Eight groups looked at two kinds of cell under a light microscope: skin peeled from inside an onion bulb, and cells gently scraped from the inside of their own cheek. Each group ticked the structures it could see.
| Structure | Onion cells | Cheek cells |
|---|---|---|
| Cell wall | 8 | 0 |
| Nucleus | 7 | 6 |
| Chloroplasts | 0 | 0 |
| Regular, brick-like shape | 8 | 0 |
Source: sample class results.
3. Which structure did every group see in the onion cells but no group see in the cheek cells? Link it to the brick-like shape of the onion cells.
4. No group saw chloroplasts in the onion cells, even though an onion is a plant. Suggest why. (Hint: where does an onion bulb grow?)
5. Two groups did not see a nucleus in the cheek cells. Does this show that some cheek cells have no nucleus? Give a reason.
6. Prove that a wombat and a wattle tree share the same levels of organisation. For each one, give an example at the cell, tissue, organ and organ system level. Then write one way they are alike and one way they differ.
Fill the gap
anchor; pump; light; does; supports. Not used: digest, soil.
Put the wombat’s levels in order
Reading down the table as printed: 4, 1, 5, 2, 3. Levels: skeletal system, organ system; bone cell, cell; whole wombat, organism; bone tissue, tissue; thigh bone, organ (made of bone tissue, blood vessels and nerves).
1. Organs (working together on a major job). Wattle: root or shoot system. Wombat: for example the circulatory or digestive system. [2 marks]
Sort it
Plants only: a cell wall, chloroplasts, a root system. Animals only: a heart, a digestive system. Both: a nucleus, a cell membrane, mitochondria, tissues, organ systems.
2. Plants have the same levels as animals, including tissues and organ systems, so they are organised living systems too; their systems (root and shoot) just look different. [2 marks]
Read the data
3. The cell wall (8 onion, 0 cheek). The stiff wall gives plant cells a fixed, regular shape; cheek cells have only a membrane. [2 marks]
4. The bulb grows underground in the dark and does not make food from light, so its cells have no chloroplasts; chloroplasts are in plant cells that get light, such as leaf cells. [2 marks]
5. No. Six of eight groups saw one, so cheek cells do have a nucleus; the others probably could not see it (poor stain or focus). Not seeing something does not prove it is absent. [2 marks]
Show What You Know
6. Marking guide: 2 wombat examples at all four levels (1 if two or three); 2 wattle examples at all four levels (1 if two or three); 1 one similarity and one difference. Wombat: muscle cell; muscle tissue; heart or stomach; circulatory or digestive system. Wattle: leaf or root cell; photosynthetic tissue; leaf, stem or root; root or shoot system. Alike: both are built from cells, tissues, organs and organ systems that work together. Different: wattle cells have cell walls (and leaf cells have chloroplasts), and it has root and shoot systems instead of organs such as a heart. [5 marks]
Common error to watch for: putting the nucleus, mitochondria or cell membrane in “Animals only”. Plant cells have all three, plus a cell wall and chloroplasts.