1. Ch. 2 Lesson 2 Plant Adaptations pgs. 84-87
EQ: In what ways to plants respond to their environments? How can I identify the features of plants that allow them to survive in their habitats?

2. How do plants respond to their environments?
Plants can’t move like animals do.
However, plants do react to changes in their environments.
A stimulus is something in an environment that causes a living thing to react.

3. Stimulus and Response
How does a plant react to a stimulus, or respond?
It changes direction or pattern of growth.
Plants respond to water by growing their roots toward the water’s source.
The roots of most plants grow downward –the same direction as the pull of gravity.
The stems grow upward, away from gravity.

4. Tropism
The responses of plants to light, water, and gravity are tropisms.
A tropism is the reaction of a plant to something in it’s environment.
What causes tropism?
Scientist, Charles Darwin did an experiment to find out.
He took 2 plant shoots. He covered the tip of one with a cap made of tin foil. He let the other grow normally.
Results showed: the shoot covered in tin foil didn’t bend toward light. There was something in the tip that caused the shoot to bend and later found it was a chemical all plants have in order to grow.

5. What are some plant adaptations?
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Just like camels other desert plants need to conserve water, so do desert plants.
A cactus, has soft tissue that holds water like a sponge. It has a thick, waxy cover to keep water inside.

6. What are some plant adaptations?
Plants outside the desert have different adaptations. Cold winter air can harm the leaves of trees.
This is why some trees lose their leaves during winter. This adaptation, protects the leaves from the freezing air.
Without leaves, the trees can’t make food, instead trees used food it stored during summer.
In spring, the tree grows new leaves and stores food for next winter.

7. Can you spot the adaptation?

8. Some more adaptations!

9. How do plants respond to their environment?
Plants can grow toward or away from a stimulus, such as light, water, or gravity

10. What is a stimulus?
A stimulus is something in the environment that causes a living thing to react.

11. Which word describes a plants response to its environment?
A. tropical
B. tropism
C. gravity
D. stimulus

12. How is it possible for plants to live in many different environments?
Plants have adaptations that help them survive under certain conditions in their environment.

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