Greetings! My name is Candy! I come from planet Hershey. I am interested in learning about the characteristics of life. Could you teach me?

Hi! I would love to. Let's start with adaptation.

One day, Andrew saw a weird gray ship land near the beach. He approached the ship, and suddenly a pink alien emerged.

Adaptation is when organisms develop special characteristics to help them survive. An example of adaptation would be a cactus. Cacti have adapted for survival in the desert by growing long roots to collect water, and a big stem to store that water in for long periods of time. 

Those things look scary, let's move on!

The next characteristic of life I will be teaching you about is reproduction. Reproduction is when two organisms create an offspring. The two big elephants reproduced and created a baby elephant to keep their species alive.

WOAH!! They are huge! That baby is so cute. What is next?

WOW! They are taller than you! I am so interested now, let's hurry along.

Life and growth is a characteristic of life. Every living thing grows and gets bigger, and as it gets older it will develop into a more complex version of itself. These trees started out as tiny little saplings, and now they are huge!

This is called food Candy. This is what living organisms eat to survive. Metabolism breaks down the food and transforms it into energy. This is the fourth characteristic of life.

Wow, I'm getting hungry. We will have to come back here once you're done teaching me.

These cells are so tiny! What is next?

This is called a cell Candy. Everything is made of cells, including you. All living things also have DNA. Cells group into tissue, and tissue groups into organs which keeps organisms alive.

Response to stimuli is the sixth characteristic I will explain to you. Do you see the dog over there? He is protecting himself from something harmful. The dog is laying under the tree because he is hot, this is an example of response to stimuli.

That puppy is so cute! I wonder what else there could be to learn?