Dead leaf or sphinx moth?
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There are three kingdoms in nature, each forming the subject of a particular science -- the animal kingdom (zoology), the vegetable kingdom (botany) and the mineral kingdom (mineralogy). Even if certain insects look like plants, and others have a shellas hard as rock, they still move about, breathe, eat and mate. So they are definitely animals.
To classify the animals, scientists divided them into groups according to their physical characteristics. Those that have an internal skeleton belong to the Chordata phylum (phylum means category). Those presenting an external skeleton, like insects, belong to the Arthropoda phylum.
Each phylum is in turn subdivided into even more specific sections: the animal classes.
The chordates, for example, include the birds and mammals and the arthropods include crustaceans, arachnids and insects. The insects are therefore in a class of their own, namely, the Insecta class.
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Mineral, Vegetable or Animal?