Life Cycles

 


Learn about life cycles with our life cycles topic and print our useful life cycle teaching resources for primary aged children (4-11). Looking at the different stages plants and animals go through during their life span is an important part of the primary science curriculum and helps children build their knowledge of the world around them.

Life Cycles for Kids

All animals and plants go through changes in their lives starting as eggs or seeds, growing throughout their life until the reach adulthood and reproduce, starting the cycle again. Some life cycles last for years, such as humans, others such as butterflies can take weeks. 

You can explore life cycles by -

  • growing plants from seed and watching the changes that occur
  • Exploring your garden, looking for eggs and young creatures, and returning to monitor them as they grow. If you have a pond you might be lucky enough to get frogspawn.
  • Visiting local farms. Many have special days in spring where children can handle young animals.
  • Taking a regular nature walk in the same place, watching the changes you see in the plants and animals.
  • Looking at photos of grandparents and other family members at different stages in their life. 
  • Visiting a zoo, to see if you can identify which animals are the young.

Be careful not to disturb any wildlife.

Our Life Cycle Resources by Topic

Choose the specific plant or animal that you want to study below.

Use these interesting and fun resources to learn about the life cycle of a bat with your...

Growing beanstalks is a fun way to engage children in nature study and adds a cross-curriculum...

Learn about the process of metamorphosis and how the catepillar transforms into a butterfly with...

Finding frogspawn and watching for tadpole and then frogs is one of the great pleasures of...

Did you know that hedgehogs are one of only three British mammals that hibernate in winter? (The...

Read about the life cycle of the honey bee below, or scroll down to access our printable...

Learn about the interesting and unusual life cycle of a jellyfish and back up what you've...

Learn a little about owls and their life cycle with this collection of colouring pages,...

Learn about the life cycle of a squirrel with these printable teaching resources which we've...

With their beautiful yellow flowers growing sunflowers is a great way to teach children about...

Children can learn about the life cycle of a turkey here with the help of our collection of...

Our Life Cycle Resources by Activity

If you are looking for a particular type of life cycle resource, for example a word search or posters, this is the place to look.

These life cycle slideshows are the perfect way to introduce a new topic. They can be displayed...

Our life cycle colouring pages come in labelled or unlabelled. We also have a set of individual...

Choose from individual posters of each stage, labelled or unlabelled cycles or photo posters in...

For each of life cycle sets we have a choice of two worksheets, one blank and an easier version...

Whether you are looking at beans, butterlies, frogs or sunflowers our life cycle matching cards...

We've two different activities to help your children learn the sequence of life cycle stages...

These life cycle diary booklets are made for children to record their observations as they grow...

We've so many options to choose from in our life cycle story paper that we think you'll...

These life cycle notebooking pages are perfect for older children working on a life cycle...

Test your children's knowledge of life cycles with our cloze worksheets. Read the text and...

These life cycle word cards are perfect for classroom displays. Why not pair the with some of...

Add some fun to a life cycle project with these life cycle word searches - choose from bean,...

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