The 6th grade biology unit is made up of two parts, one entitled "What are the characteristics of life?" and the other "How do you stop an invasion?" In the first part, "What are the characteristics of life?" students discover that plants, animals and cellular organisms all share common characteristics needed to live. Students will explore three characteristics of life (food, movement and growth) through the first hand observations of a mini-aquatic ecosystem and experimentation with seedlings.

In this part of the unit students will learn that:

• All organisms have needs for survival.
• All organisms are composed of cells and have the same survival needs as larger organisms.
• Food can be used as fuel or building materials.
• Food can be used immediately or it can be stored for later use.
• Plants and animals differ in how they obtain food.

In the second part of the unit, "How do you stop an invasion?" Students are asked to take on the role of scientists and are given the real life task of constructing a plan for stopping an invasive species from continuing to enter an aquatic environment. Though the process of understanding this problem, students learn about relationships between organisms. By studying the Great Lakes food web, students are able to see how the sea lamprey competes with other organisms for survival and creates problems for other organisms in the ecosystem.

In this part of the unit, students will learn that:

• Organisms interact with each other in many ways.
• Some organisms compete with each other for resources.
• An organism's body structure helps it to make or find food and reproduce.