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2nd grade · Science · Unit 3 of 14

Animal Life Cycles

Eggs, larvae, tadpoles and chicks

What your child practices

Life cycles of butterflies, frogs, chickens and mammals, and how some animals change a lot while others look like small adults.

Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) teks student expectation: 2.13(D) · life cycles such as the butterfly's and the frog's, whose young do not look like their parents

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. Many animals hatch from eggs: birds, frogs, butterflies.
  2. Some change a lot as they grow, like a caterpillar becoming a butterfly.
  3. Others, like puppies, look like small adults.

Example: What does a tadpole turn into? A tadpole lives in a pond and grows legs. It becomes a frog. Answer: a frog

Animal Life Cycles in Texas

In the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS), this is unit 3 of 14 in 2nd grade Science, after Changing Materials and before Push & Pull.

Gradelings describes a child's practice on this unit as Beginning, Approaching, Meeting or Exceeding (Four practice steps). That reflects practice, not a report-card mark: the teacher decides the mark.

Source: Texas Education Agency (TEA)

Sample questions

A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.

  1. Question 1

    Which animal hatches from an egg?

    • 🐮a calf
    • 🐶a puppy
    • 🐦a robin

  2. Question 2

    Which animal is born alive and drinks its mother's milk?

    • 🐱a kitten
    • 🐥a chick
    • a tadpole

  3. Question 3

    What does a caterpillar turn into?

    • 🐝a bee
    • 🕷️a spider
    • 🦋a butterfly

  4. Question 4

    Which of these animals changes shape the most as it grows?

    • a cow
    • a butterfly
    • a rabbit

  5. Question 5

    Which animal has a tail when it is young but not when it is an adult?

    • 🐈a cat
    • 🐕a dog
    • 🐸a frog

  6. Question 6

    What does a baby frog hatch from?

    • 🌱a seed
    • 🪺a nest of twigs
    • 🥚an egg

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