IB Biology C4.2 Pub Quiz: Transfers of energy and matter

What it covers

IB Biology at SL, with HL cards when you switch the level: C4.2 Transfers of energy and matter.

The running order

nine rounds and a handout of riddles. Review rounds are drawn from this topic each time you open the quiz, so two classes never get the same paper, and every review round can be redrawn in a click.

1. Riddle me this review
   Course terms as riddles: "I have a head that loves water and two tails that hate it…" Teams write what it is.
2. Close-up fun
   A tiny zoomed-in patch. What's the full picture?
3. Fact or fiction fun
   Myths and true-but-weird facts. Teams write Fact or Fiction.
4. Think it through review
   Scenarios, odd ones out, true or false and why, puzzles: questions to reason through. Give teams a little longer.
5. Films in science-speak fun
   A film plot, described like a research abstract. Name the film.
6. Who am I? Scientists fun
   Three clues, hardest first. 3 points after clue 1, 2 after clue 2, 1 after clue 3.
7. Missing vowels: course terms review
   Your key terms with the vowels taken out.
8. Funny animal noises fun
   YouTube clips of animals making ridiculous noises. Screen off, listen, guess, then watch the reveal.
9. Closest wins fun
   Estimation questions. Nearest team wins the point. Doubles as the tiebreaker.

A taste of the questions

Think it through

Scenarios, odd ones out and true or false and why, from IB Biology.

1. True or false, and why? A peat bog that takes in more CO₂ each year than it gives out is a carbon source.
2. A rainforest is felled and burned. Does it become a carbon sink or a carbon source?
3. In a food web, why does the arrow point from the grass to the rabbit, not the other way?
4. I live in total darkness, yet I make my own carbon compounds from CO₂. My energy comes from rusting iron. How do I feed?
5. What would happen in a forest if all its decomposers disappeared?
6. A bracket fungus has no mouth. How does it feed on a dead log?

Riddle me this

Course terms as riddles. Teams write what it is.

1. I make my own carbon compounds from simple inorganic stuff, using light or chemical energy. What am I?
2. I digest my dinner outside my body, spilling enzymes onto dead matter and soaking up the soup. What am I?
3. I'm a rung on the food chain ladder: producer, primary consumer, secondary consumer. What am I?
4. I wiggle down every northern summer and up every winter, but I've kept climbing year on year since 1958 on Mauna Loa. What am I?
5. I'm a peat bog or a young forest: I take in more of a greenhouse gas than I give out, and lock it away. What am I?

Quickfire

Short recall from the same topics.

1. Energy and matter both enter and leave
2. Energy can enter and leave, matter cannot
3. Main energy source of most ecosystems