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Significance
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Moving in unison creates collective vision. Fish use a complex set of lateral body movements to communicate in all aquarium environments. In schools, the message spreads quickly, allowing fish to discover how to survive, thrive and procreate together.
Protection
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Big schools thwart big predators. Dash-or-swarm "flash expansion" occurs when an aquarium fish signals to its mates to scatter in all directions from a predator. Alternately, a school can swarm around an attacker to stop it from devouring any more individuals in the school.
Procreation
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It takes a community to raise a fish. Individuals are more likely to find their mates among members of a school. Fish that have recently reproduced will often lead their schooled babies around an aquarium soon after birth.
Exploration
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Schools bond more easily with their habitats. Schools help individual fish collectively sense all the features of aquariums: caves, rock formations and foliage. Fish often form a school that blankets any area as they explore it.
Confusion
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Confusion can provide protection. In a very large aquarium, a school of fish may try to disorient its attacker by swirling around the predator. In that case, a predator sees so many fish that it doesn't know which one to attack.
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Fish Schooling Behavior in an Aquarium
Fish form schools, or groups, in order to live, feed and breed together—behavior in which they also engage in an aquarium. The school acts as an aquarium community. In schools, fish of similar size and age form an extended family that brings aquariums alive.