Grade 4 Sense & Respond worksheet
from Gradelings · Name: ______________________
How to explain it
- Your senses notice things: eyes, ears, nose, tongue and skin.
- Nerves carry a message to your brain. Your brain decides, then your muscles move.
- A reflex is extra fast: the message goes to your spinal cord and straight back.
- Some animals have special senses, like bats hearing echoes or sharks sensing electric signals.
Example: You smell smoke. What happens first? Something must notice the smoke before your brain can act. Your nose senses the smell, then nerves carry the message to your brain. Answer: your nose senses the smoke
Question 1
You touch a hot pan by accident. Put this fast reflex in order.
- 🧠Your brain notices: "Ouch, hot!"
- 💪Arm muscles pull your hand away
- ✋Nerves in your skin sense the heat
- ⚡A message zips to your spinal cord
- ↩️Your spinal cord sends a message right back
Nerves in your skin sense the heat → A message zips to your spinal cord → Your spinal cord sends a message right back → Arm muscles pull your hand away → Your brain notices: "Ouch, hot!"
Hint: A reflex is a shortcut! The message goes to your spinal cord and straight back to your muscles. Your brain notices the pain a moment later.
Question 2
Which response helps an animal survive a cold winter?
- 🐕A dog chases a ball
- 🐦A bird sings in spring
- 🦇A bat hibernates in a cave
- 🐈A cat purrs on a lap
🦇 A bat hibernates in a cave
Hint: Hibernating saves energy when food is hard to find in winter.
Question 3
How do bats find flying insects in the dark?
🦇- They follow the moonlight
- They feel the insects with their wings
- Their eyes glow like flashlights
- They listen for echoes of their own calls
They listen for echoes of their own calls
Hint: Bats make high-pitched sounds. The sounds bounce off insects, and bats listen for the echoes. This is called echolocation.
Question 4
Who is responding: a plant or an animal? Tap an item, then tap its basket.
Sort into: 🪴 plant · 🐾 animal
- 🐦geese fly south for the winter
- 🪟stem bends toward a sunny window
- 🐇rabbit freezes when it spots a hawk
- ❄️snowshoe hare's fur turns white
- 🍂tree drops its leaves in autumn
- 🌿tendril curls around a stick
🪴 plant: stem bends toward a sunny window, tree drops its leaves in autumn, tendril curls around a stick · 🐾 animal: geese fly south for the winter, rabbit freezes when it spots a hawk, snowshoe hare's fur turns white
Hint: Plants respond slowly, by growing, bending or dropping leaves. Animals can move their whole bodies, change their fur, or sleep through winter.
Question 5
On a hot day, your body sweats. How does sweating help you?
🥵- It warms you up
- It helps you hear better
- It makes you grow taller
- It cools you down
It cools you down
Hint: When sweat dries on your skin, it carries heat away. That's your body responding to heat!
Question 6
Why do you pull your hand off something hot before you even feel the pain?
✋- It's a reflex: your spinal cord sends the message back fast
- Your ears hear the heat
- Your hand muscles can think on their own
- Your eyes see the heat first
It's a reflex: your spinal cord sends the message back fast
Hint: In a reflex, the message takes a shortcut through your spinal cord, so you move before your brain notices.
Question 7
Many trees drop their leaves in autumn. What are they responding to?
🍂- People raking the yard
- Longer, warmer days
- Birds singing in the branches
- Shorter days and colder weather
Shorter days and colder weather
Hint: When days get shorter and colder, many trees drop their leaves to save water and energy for winter.
Question 8
Salmon swim back to the stream where they hatched. Which sense helps them find it?
🐟- 👂hearing
- 👃smell
- 👀sight
- 👅taste
👃 smell
Hint: Each stream has its own smell. Salmon remember the smell of home and follow it back.
Question 9
The school bell rings. Put the steps of your response in order.
- ⚡Nerves carry a message to your brain
- 🏃Your muscles move you to line up
- 👂Your ears sense the sound
- 🧠Your brain decides what to do
Your ears sense the sound → Nerves carry a message to your brain → Your brain decides what to do → Your muscles move you to line up
Hint: Your senses notice first. Nerves carry the message to your brain, your brain decides, then your muscles move.
Question 10
Something in the environment that a living thing reacts to is called a…
📢- fossil
- habitat
- stimulus
- response
stimulus
Hint: A stimulus is what you sense (like a loud noise). A response is what you do about it (like jumping).
Answer key
- 1. Nerves in your skin sense the heat → A message zips to your spinal cord → Your spinal cord sends a message right back → Arm muscles pull your hand away → Your brain notices: "Ouch, hot!"
- 2. 🦇 A bat hibernates in a cave
- 3. They listen for echoes of their own calls
- 4. 🪴 plant: stem bends toward a sunny window, tree drops its leaves in autumn, tendril curls around a stick · 🐾 animal: geese fly south for the winter, rabbit freezes when it spots a hawk, snowshoe hare's fur turns white
- 5. It cools you down
- 6. It's a reflex: your spinal cord sends the message back fast
- 7. Shorter days and colder weather
- 8. 👃 smell
- 9. Your ears sense the sound → Nerves carry a message to your brain → Your brain decides what to do → Your muscles move you to line up
- 10. stimulus
Want more than 10 questions?
In Gradelings the questions change every time and adjust to your child, with hints and kind feedback.