Gardening With Kindergarten and Preschool Children
All children are super curious about the world around them. As the seasons change, you can take advantage of the beautiful world outside and that natural curiosity! As the season changes to Spring, take students out into the fresh air and enjoy a walk around the schoolyard or neighborhood. Ask the children to look for changes in plant-life as they are reawakening once again. See if students can spot buds on tree branches, plants pushing up through the ground, and leaves and flowers reaching up to the bright Spring sun. After the walk, talk about the changes and observations made along the way. As students respond, list responses on the board, this chart will come in handy to review with students before any spring writing activities.
There are so many activities to do after the spring walk,. You will find lots of activities to use across the curriculum using our plants thematic unit.
One activity that is always highly enjoyed is gardening in the classroom! There are a lot of supporting videos available to get you started.. Kids love to plant! One thing I like to do is to set up my science center filled with potting soil and have a bowl of seeds to allow students to plant and water as desired. After the planting we simply let it grow! Students also like to take home a planted project. We have used egg cartons, cups, milk cartons, baggies, and even egg shells.
There are so many great supporting books, videos, songs, and etc. to support a planting unit. Our unit available at Kindergarten Kiosk is one of my absolute favorites!
