What Do Living Things Do?

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1 Getting Started
2 What Living Things Do
3 Watch and Compare at the Stations
4 List What the Living Thing Does
5 What Makes a Living Thing Living?
6 What You Covered
Pupil practice

1 - Getting Started ~5 mins

Illustration for Getting Started Look! Here is a little snail in a tub, and here is a toy car. One of them is alive and one is not. Which one do you think is alive? Put up your hand if you think it is the snail.

Key point

How can we tell? The snail does some special things that the car can never do. Today we are going to be detectives and find out what living things do.

Teacher Notes

Hold up the snail tub in one hand and the toy car in the other. Keep this light: it is just the curiosity hook, not the full investigation.

Take a few guesses. Ask How do you know the snail is alive? and let two or three children answer. Don't correct or list the rules yet, that comes next.

👇 Mark your steps as done as you complete them.

+5 XP

2 - What Living Things Do ~10 mins

Living things do three special jobs that objects can never do. Let's learn them together.

Concept	Why it matters	Example
Living thing — something that is alive, that grows, needs food and water, and moves or changes	It helps us tell the difference between a creature or plant and an object	A snail moves along the tub, eats a leaf and needs water to stay alive
Non-living thing — something that is not alive and never grows, eats, drinks or moves by itself	Objects only move when we make them, so they are not alive	A toy car only rolls when you push it, and it never grows or gets hungry
Grows — gets bigger over time, the way young living things do	Growing is one big sign that something is alive	A little bean seed pushes out a shoot and gets taller day by day

Teacher Notes

This table is the children's on-screen content for 1st Class. Read each row aloud and point at the snail and the toy car as you go.

Then model the noticing out loud before the children do it themselves: I am looking at the snail. I wonder what it does that the car cannot. I predict it will move. I am watching... yes, it slid along and left a little trail. The car stayed still until I pushed it. So I think the snail is living because it moves all by itself.

Head off the common mix-up: some children think anything that moves is alive (a car, the wind). Stress that a living thing moves by itself and also grows and needs food and water.

👇 Mark your steps as done as you complete them.

+10 XP

3 - Watch and Compare at the Stations ~18 mins

Illustration for Watch and Compare at the Stations Now it is your turn to be a noticing detective. At each station you will look at one living thing and one object next to it.

Key point

First, before you look closely, tell your group what you think the living thing will do. Then watch very carefully. What does the snail or the bean do that the object never does? Does it move? Is it growing? Does it need food or water?

Talk about it with your group, then we will write it down.

Teacher Notes

Set up 3 stations before the lesson. Push back desks into station tables. Station 1: a snail (or woodlouse) in a clear tub next to a small stone. Station 2: a sprouting bean in a jar next to a toy car. Station 3: a potted plant or daisy next to a teddy or pencil case.

Move groups round in turn, about 5 minutes each. At each station ask: What is it doing? Could the object ever do that?

Look-fors:

Children pointing out movement (the snail), growth (the bean shoot, the plant)
Children saying the living thing needs water or food
Children noticing the object stays exactly the same

Differentiation: for children who need support, give a simple choice — does it move, yes or no? For fast finishers, ask them to whisper-predict what the snail will do next.

+15 XP

4 - List What the Living Thing Does ~9 mins

Let's sort what we noticed. On your journal page you have a living thing on one side and an object on the other.

Key point

In the middle, draw or write what the living thing does that the object never does. Did the snail move? Did the bean grow? Did the plant need water? Show your group your page when you finish.

Teacher Notes

Pupils complete their ComparisonTable journal page: living thing · object · what's different. This is the paper record for the lesson.

Drive the make-sense as a sorting talk: read out things one at a time — moves by itself, gets bigger, needs a drink, stays exactly the same, only moves when pushed — and ask the class which side each belongs on. Build a simple class list of what living things do (grows, needs food and water, moves or changes).

Keep this oral and on paper, not typed.

+15 XP

5 - What Makes a Living Thing Living? ~5 mins

Let's talk together. What did the snail and the bean do that the stone and the toy car never did?

Think about this

Think about this: how do we know if something is alive? What three jobs do all living things do? Can you point to a living thing here in our classroom or out in the school garden?

Teacher Notes

This is a display-only science-talk beat — children think and talk, nothing is typed.

Draw out the three big signs together: living things grow, need food and water, and move or change. Revoice children's answers so the whole class hears them.

Finish with a noticing prompt for the school garden — can you spot a living thing on the way out today?

Homework (noticing task, recorded on paper): ask children to find one living thing at home and draw one thing it does that an object cannot.

+10 XP

6 - What You Covered ~3 mins

Today you were living-thing detectives. Here is what we found out:

Living things grow, need food and water, and move or change by themselves.
Non-living objects never grow, eat, drink, or move by themselves.
A snail moves and a bean grows, but a stone and a toy car always stay the same.
You can tell something is living by watching for these three special jobs.

Teacher Notes

Quick recap to close. Point at the snail and the toy car one last time and ask the class to call out which is living and why.

Make sure the snail and any minibeasts are returned outdoors gently, and everyone washes their hands.

+5 XP

Pupil practice · Investigation Journal

Module 1 · Living Things: Living, Non-living, Our Senses and Growing

Lesson 3 · What Do Living Things Do?

End of lesson

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Teacher Class Feed

1 - Getting Started ~5 mins

2 - What Living Things Do ~10 mins

3 - Watch and Compare at the Stations ~18 mins

4 - List What the Living Thing Does ~9 mins

5 - What Makes a Living Thing Living? ~5 mins

6 - What You Covered ~3 mins

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