Who Eats Plants? Lesson Plan

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What We Are Learning

 

Science Focus:

plant parts

 

Theme Vocabulary Words:

seeds, stems, roots, flowers, leaves, fruit, petals

 

Skills We’re Practicing:

group discussion, critical thinking, vocabulary, color recognition

  • Think plants stay still? Think again! Plants Can’t Sit Still by Rebecca E. Hirsch shows all the ways plants move. When you’re done reading the book, play our Plants Dance Break video so children can move like plants too!

Plant in a Jar

Materials: glass jar for each student or pair of students, lima beans or butter beans, cotton balls, water, masking tape

  • Watch a plant grow—in a jar! 
  • In advance, ask families to send in a small glass jar from home. If there aren’t enough for each child, they can work in pairs.
  • Give children enough cotton balls to fill their jar without spilling over the top. Then give children 2 or 3 beans to place into their jar. The beans should be placed deep in the jar, but on the outer edge so the roots and sprouts can be easily seen as they grow. Finally, add just enough water to dampen the cotton balls, not soak them. Label each child’s or pair’s jar with masking tape.
  • Place the jars in a sunny spot in the classroom. Beans should sprout in a few days. Have children monitor the growth of their bean plants by drawing the changes they see each day. Encourage them to identify the different parts and use their proper terms—seed, root, and stem—as they discuss their plants and draw them. simple experiment/observation

Materials: blue, brown, and green construction paper, cupcake liners, scissors, green pipe cleaners, yarn, green markers, glue, tape, seeds, Plant Labels skill sheet

  • Follow these steps to create a 3-D plant diagram!
  • Give each child 2 pieces of construction paper, one blue and one brown. Say that the blue is the sky and the brown is the soil. Guide them in taping papers together so the blue paper is above the brown paper.
  • Then have children make their plants. First, tape a pipe cleaner to the blue construction paper to make the stem. Add roots by gluing yarn to the soil beneath the pipe cleaner. Draw green leaves with a marker or cut them from green paper and glue them on. Finally, make the flower by gluing the cupcake liner to the top of the pipe cleaner and adding seeds to the middle.
  • If you’d like, have children cut out the words on the Plant Labels skill sheet and guide them in labeling the plant’s parts. fine-motor skills/diagram