Rocket and Raven sit on a hill watching a meadow. Grass waves. A rabbit nibbles. High above, a hawk circles.
"The hawk eats rabbits, and rabbits eat grass," Rocket says. "So where does the hawk's energy really start?"
Raven draws arrows in her notebook. "What do you notice if we follow the arrows backward?" she asks.
Nova draws a glowing line from the hawk to the rabbit to the grass. Then the line keeps going, up to the Sun.
"Every chain starts with sunshine," Rocket says.
Green plants are producers. They use the Sun's energy directly to make their own food.
Animals are consumers. They get energy by eating other living things.
Some consumers eat plants. Others eat animals that ate plants.
A food chain shows how energy moves from one living thing to the next.
The arrows point in the direction the energy goes, from the food to the eater.
Sun, then grass, then rabbit, then hawk.
Every food chain starts with the Sun and a producer.
Consumers that eat plants come next.
Consumers that eat those animals come after them.
You built food chains like an ecologist. Tomorrow we will trace the food on your own plate.