We have spent several days exploring seeds and today we started off by reading the book “The Tiny Seed” by Eric Carle…
After reading the book, we explored a variety of different kinds of seeds. Â We started out by looking at the packages the seeds come in from the store. Â We played a little matching game first…
You can plant seeds with your students!
Then we opened up one of each kind of seed package to see what the seeds looked like. Â Before showing the seeds to the children, I would have them guess what they thought the seeds might look like first…
The children often would guess that the seeds might be the same color as the picture on the package. They also guessed that the seeds were small if the plant looked small or the seeds were big if the plant looked big. Once the children had predicted what the seeds might look like, we would open the package and pour them in a little plastic container for a closer look…
Then we passed around the seeds so the children could take a closer look. Â Some of the containers we left open but if the seeds were very tiny, we put a lid on the container to keep them from falling out onto the floor. The children liked feeling, smelling, and looking at the seeds in each container…
Once we had a chance to check out all the seeds, we matched them back up to the correct packages and made sure to label the containers…
Some of the seeds then were set out in our gardening center for the children to explore  a little more freely.  Our gardening center is a project in process but today, we simply used it to explore different kinds of seeds and the packages all the seeds came in…
Most of the seeds in the gardening center ended up all mixed together by the end of the day but the children enjoyed pouring them in and out of the little packages and plastic containers…
I will try to share more about some of the ways we played and used our gardening center in the weeks to come…
And by the way, I set aside and saved the packages of seeds that I want the children to actually plant since I knew they would mix them all up!
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