plants Archives - JDaniel4s Mom

Plant Cell Model Activity for Kids with Printables to Use

March 17, 2017 By Deirdre

This week the Virtual Book Club is exploring the book The Tiny Seed. Earlier this week I shared a flower and worm number activity that could be explored with young children based on the book. Today I wanted to share a plant cell model that could be done with older children after sharing the book with them.

How to Make the Plant Cell Model

The plant cell model activity uses a set of plant cell parts that can be printed out. Many of the other supplies you need for the plant cell model may be in your craft supply closet. If you don’t have them, you will find them at your local craft store.

Supplies for the Plant Cell Model

Styrofoam meat tray
Plant cell parts printable
Small buttons (all one color)
Medium sized buttons (all one color)
Bendy straws
Sparkly pipe cleaners
Plain pipe cleaners
Glue sticks
Scissors

Directions for Creating the Plant Cell

You will need to start by printing out the plant cell parts printable. If you can print it out it color, it would be wonderful.
Then you will need to cut out each of the labels and plant cell parts.
You will want to try to arrange them on the meat tray before you glue them down. Please make sure that you leave space for the ribosome and amyloplast buttons.
You will attach all the buttons with small sections of the pipe cleaners. After threading the pipe cleaners through the button holes, push the ends into the meat tray. Then turn the tray over and twist the ends together.
You will thread the pipe cleaners through small sections of the bendy straws to create the Golgi Apparatus. Then you will push the ends into the meat tray and twist the ends together.
The mitochondria were created by pushing the ends of the pipe cleaner into the mitochondrial shape and through the meat tray. Then the ends were twisted. Next, the pipe cleaner was bent into a squiggle.
Finally, the chloroplast was created by threading small buttons through a pipe cleaner. The ends of the pipe cleaner were pushed through the meat tray and twisted.

Here are some more plant themed activities for kids:

Number Activities with Printable Flowers and Worms

Kids Science Activity- Planting and Growing Grass Words

Plant Growth Algorithm Coding Sheet

Parts of a Flower Craft for Kids

STEM Gardening- Paper Plate Greenhouse

Plant Life Cycle Activity and Printable Cards

April 13, 2016 By Deirdre

The pictures used to illustrate the plant life cycle were actually drawn to be used on the Plant Growth Algorithm Worksheet. I thought it would be fun to use them to create a second activity with. This plant life cycle activity is supposed to look like plant stakes displaying the various stages of plant growth.

Here are stages the plant life cycle pictures illustrate:

Seeds in a packet
Seed in the ground
Seed with a small root
Seed with root growing and spreading out
Seed with stem forming ( Yes, the stem looks a little like a leaf.)
Seed with stem above the ground and a leaf
A full grown plant

Putting the plant life cycle activity together:

A large mailing envelope was cut in half length wise.
Two horizontal rows of slits were cut into the envelope. The bottom row has four slits and the top row has three.
The plant life cycle pictures were cut out and glued to colored Popsicle sticks. ( You don’t have to use colored Popsicle sticks if you don’t want to.)
The plant pictures on sticks were placed into the slits in order from seed to plant.

Other ways to use this plant life cycle activity

You can leave out some of the pictures and have your children place the missing pictures into the right spots.
You can not place the pictures on stick and glue them in order on to a piece or construction paper.
You can place the plant pictures in stack. Take turn picking a picture and sharing what picture would come before and after that stage in the plant life cycle.

Here are some more wonderful plant themed activities:

Recycled Planter on a String

Parts of a Plant We Eat Flannel Activity

STEM Gardening Paper Plate Greenhouse

You will find more gardening activities on my Gardening board on Pinterest.

Parts of a Plant We Eat Activity

March 10, 2016 By Deirdre

Children are always surprised to find out that vegetables come from so many different parts of a plant. They may be the stem, the roots, or the leaves of a plant. Some of the vegetables we eat are actually the seeds of the plant. While some of the foods we call vegetables aren’t vegetables at all, the are really the fruit of the plant.

Last year I made a gardening board and some vegetables for an activity on the amazing blog Totschooling called Where do Vegetables Grow? It looked at where vegetables grow and focused on the positional words above and below. Well, I still have all of its components and thought it would be fun to find a new way to use them. This activity looks at just want part of the plant each food is and whether it is really a fruit. Let me share with you each of the foods focused on in the activity and where it grows.

Peas- Seeds
Asparagus- Stem
Cucumber- Fruit
Bean- Seeds
Corn- Seeds
Tomato- Fruit
Onion- Root
Radish-Root
Carrot- Root

I bet you weren’t surprised by the tomato, but did the cucumber surprise you. There are probably a number of you that haven’t really thought about whether either of these are fruit or not. They are fruit due to the fact that they house the seeds of a plant.

How We Explored Parts of a Plant

I created a soil, ground, sky board by attaching burlap to a piece of cardboard. We used that as our work space. We started by sorting the felt vegetables I made by where they grew. (Just like the above and below lesson.) Then we talked about plant parts they looked like. That lead to a discussion of whether it looked like what we thought a root or stem or seed or fruit looked like. It was important to make connection between what was already known or understood and the new information that was being shared.

You may be thinking that you like this activity, but you don’t have time to create a set of felt vegetables. Well, you don’t have to! I am making the set of printable vegetable learning cards I made for Totschooling available to you. They are labeled pictures of the felt vegetable I made.

You will find more science experiments like this simple pendulum experiment on my Early Learning Science board on Pinterest. Please take moment to check them out.

Rosie Sprout’s Time to Shine- Read.Explore.Learn.

April 26, 2013 By Deirdre

JDaniel and I were browsing at the library last week when I noticed the book Rosie Sprout’s Time to Shine sitting on top of the shelves. I have been wanting to start some spring planting projects with JDaniel so, I took it down and added it to our library pile. It is a wonderful book. The librarian that set it up on the shelf deserves my thanks!

In the story Rosie Sprout’s Time to Shine Rosie isn’t the star of her class at school. Violet is the star and everyone else in the class agreed that she was. Well, everyone except Rosie. She was tired of hearing everyone praise Violet including Violet. Yes, she did everything well, but enough was enough.When everyone is asked to decorate a flower pot, Violet’s is the best decorated and Rosie contained a simple heart. Rosie and Violet are the first to have a sprout, but Violet shouts it out first. When Violets starts to be taller than Rosie’s, she can’t take it. Rosie has to push soil over top of it.

Rosie regrets her mistake when she finds out that Violet has the chicken pox and won’t be able to tend to her plant. That is when Rosie really shines. She is the best she can be and she is the best friend she can be. Rosie sings and tends to both her plant and Violet’s.

You will have to read Rosie Sprout’s Time to Shine to see what happens when Violet gets back from being sick. Just know that this really is Rosie’s time to shine.

What did we do to explore Rosie Sprout’s Time to Shine?

Number Recognition

JDaniel and I worked with homemade pea pods. Some of the peas had number represented by numbers. Some peas had numbers represented by dots. Some of the peas had numbers represented by triangles.

The goal was to put the three peas that belonged together in the same pod.

Letter and Sound Match

This pea pod letter and sound matching activity is just like the math pea pod activity. The goals was to find the three peas that belonged in the same pod together.

When pod had its three pods, it should have an uppercase letter, a lowercase letter, and an object that began with that letter. I was really pleased to see that JDaniel could match each of the letters quickly and find the right picture for each pod. He did change the game a little, but I will share that story with you next Wednesday. It deserves its on post.

Decorating a Flower Pot

JDaniel was asked to paint whatever he wanted to on this flower pot. Rosie was told to decorate her post anyway that she wanted to and I told JDaniel the same thing.

He really wasn’t into painting the afternoon I set out the paint and flower pot. He painted the jellyfishes bell shape and didn’t want to paint the tentacles. I talked him in to doing some if I did some too.

I wasn’t surprised that this pot as a jellyfish them. We read books about them everyday. You may remember I even made him a jellyfish mobile for his room.

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