Taking a village pond as your example, explain how its living and non-living parts work together as one ecosystem.

1. 1 · Define. An ecosystem is all the organisms of an area together with the non-living parts they interact with.
2. 2 · Abiotic components. Non-living: water, sunlight, temperature, dissolved oxygen, carbon dioxide, minerals and soil.
3. 3 · Biotic components.
   • Producers: phytoplankton and rooted water plants.
   • Consumers: insects, small fish, big fish, frogs.
   • Decomposers: bacteria and fungi.
4. 4 · How they interact. Plants use sunlight, water and CO₂ to make food; animals eat them; decomposers return nutrients to the water and soil.
5. 5 · Close in one line. So the living and non-living parts depend on each other.

Scoring tip: Give at least two examples of each component; a list without examples loses marks.