Help your students understand what makes something alive with this growing Characteristics of Living Things Bundle for middle school science. Students explore the differences between living, once-living, and nonliving things while learning how organisms are organized, use energy, grow, respond to stimuli, maintain homeostasis, and carry out other essential life processes.

This bundle currently includes a complete lesson, two differentiated scientific readings, three data graphing investigations, and a student research activity. Together, the resources provide multiple ways for students to learn, apply, review, and extend their understanding of the characteristics of life.

The activities are designed primarily for Grades 6–8, with an additional advanced reading appropriate for Grade 8 and up.

This Is a Growing Bundle!

Additional Characteristics of Living Things resources will be added to this bundle over time. Purchase now and receive all future additions at no additional cost. The price will increase as new resources are added.

What’s Currently Included

1. Characteristics of Living Things Lesson

A complete lesson introducing the characteristics shared by living organisms and the evidence scientists use to distinguish living things from nonliving things. Students examine cells, energy use, growth and development, reproduction, responses to stimuli, homeostasis, and adaptation.

2. Characteristics of Living Things Reading: What Is Life? – Grades 6–8

A middle school scientific reading that helps students determine what makes something alive. Students compare living, once-living, and nonliving examples while learning why movement, growth, or appearance alone cannot prove that something is alive.

3. Characteristics of Living Things Reading Comprehension – Grade 8 and Up

A more advanced scientific reading examining cells, DNA, metabolism, homeostasis, dormancy, death, and biological origin. Students apply scientific criteria to challenging examples such as dormant seeds, wood, fossils, viruses, fire, crystals, and robots.

4. Characteristics of Living Things Data Graphing Lab Bundle

Three print-and-go data investigations in which students create graphs, analyze patterns, and connect real-world data to essential life processes:

• Growth and Development
• Metabolism and Energy Use
• Response to Stimuli and Homeostasis

5. “I Was Today Years Old When I Learned…” Characteristics of Life Research Activity

A student-centered research activity in which students investigate an unusual organism and discover something surprising about how it carries out essential life processes. Students summarize their discovery and communicate what they learned to their classmates.

Topics Covered

• Characteristics shared by living organisms
• Living, once-living, and nonliving things
• Cells and biological organization
• Growth and development
• Metabolism and energy use
• Response to internal and external stimuli
• Homeostasis
• Reproduction and heredity
• Adaptation and survival
• Dormancy versus death
• Scientific evidence used to identify life
• Unusual organisms and their life processes

Skills Your Students Will Develop

• Identify and explain the major characteristics of living things
• Classify examples as living, once-living, or nonliving
• Use multiple lines of evidence to determine whether something is alive
• Read and interpret grade-appropriate scientific information
• Create and interpret graphs using biological data
• Analyze patterns and relationships in real-world data
• Support scientific explanations with evidence
• Research unusual organisms using reliable sources
• Communicate scientific discoveries clearly
• Apply characteristics-of-life concepts to unfamiliar examples

This growing bundle is ideal for introducing a Characteristics of Living Things unit, reinforcing important biology concepts, providing meaningful graphing practice, or reviewing how scientists determine whether something is alive. The variety of lessons, readings, data investigations, and research tasks makes it easy to support different learners while building scientific literacy, data-analysis skills, and evidence-based reasoning.