The Oceans

The ocean is very big and vast, almost 70% of the earth is covered by water.

Our earth consists of four major oceans called the Atlantic, Pacific, Indian and Arctic oceans.

The dark blue outline shows us one of the major oceans on earth, the Atlantic.

Hi! I am earth, can you believe I am made up of almost 70% ocean?

My oceans take up a lot of space! The Atlantic isn't the biggest here on earth. The Pacific Ocean outlined in dark blue is the biggest ocean on earth.

Life Inside the Ocean

The oceans have so many living organisms in them, scientists say there are more than 1 million living animals inside them!

Animals in the ocean can be very big, or extremely small!

This is krill, a small ocean animal that is usually known for being eaten by whales!

Hey again! Did you know that Blue Whales are the largest animal on earth? They can be found in our oceans!

Regardless of how big or small the animal is, they all live together in an ecosystem.

An ecosystem is a biological community of interacting organisms and their environment.

What Makes Up an Ecosystem?

An ecosystem is made up FOUR different levels of organization.

The ocean is one of the many places in the world considered an ecosystem, and is easily the largest.

Some ecosystems are very small, like a puddle in your yard with insects, bugs, living and non-living things.

Ecosystems are very important to me. They contain both living and non-living things, while coexisting with one another.

The four levels of an ecosystem are...

Individual

Population

Community

Ecosystem

Individual

The "Individual" level of an ecosystem refers to a single living organism.

In the ocean, we can imagine this as a giant blue whale.

The blue whale by itself, is considered an individual at this level.

Population

A "Population" is known as a group of organisms living together of the same species.

In the ocean setting, the blue whale would be living with other blue whales.

If a blue whale and a shark are living together, they are NOT considered apart of the same population.

Community

A "Community" is when different species live among one another.

Instead of just whales living together, the whales live among krill, sharks, fish, turtles, and all other living organisms.

Ecosystem

Finally, the "Ecosystem" is much like we described before. All organisms living together and working among each other.

One thing that separates an ecosystem from a community is that an ecosystem has organisms that are both living AND non-living.