What Are Producers, Consumers and Decomposers?

Producers, consumers and decomposers each play a specific role within food chains. 

• Producers use energy from the sun to create their own food through the process of photosynthesis. The most common producers are plants.
• Consumers cannot make their own food. They must source food in the form of plants and other animals.
• Decomposers source their energy from organisms that are dead and/or breaking down. Through this process, they return nutrients to the soil for producers to use. 

This set of reading passages has been designed to explain the role of producers, consumers and decomposers within ecosystems to students in age-appropriate language. The resource download contains the following for each of these roles (producer, consumer, decomposer):

• Reading passage
• 4 x questions (3 x multiple choice, 1 x short response)
• Answer key

Multiple Applications for This Food Chains Worksheet

In addition to independent student work time, why not use this worksheet as a:

• Whole-class activity (via smartboard)
• Collaborative group task
• Homework activity
• Summative assessment

Download the File Format That Suits You!

Use the dropdown menu to access the editable Google Slides or quick-print PDF version of this resource.

As this resource contains an answer sheet, we recommend printing one copy of the entire file, then removing the student pages for photocopying. 

Please consider printing this worksheet double-sided for sustainability purposes.

This resource was created by Kaitlyn Blevins, a teacher in Georgia and a Teach Starter collaborator.

Click below for more time-saving resources to use when exploring food chains with your students!

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