During this lesson students will learn the six basic plant parts, gain an understanding of how they function to support plant survival, and create a vegetable wrap using all plant parts. A game will help students to begin thinking of the food they eat in terms of botany.
During this lesson, students will explore the many ways in which seeds move away from their parent plant. Students will have the opportunity to explore and examine the diverse world of seeds, become engineers during the Build a Seed activity, and have the opportunity to save seeds from their own garden.
During this lesson students will explore the garden habitat through game based learning, garden exploration, and working in the garden to improve their own schoolyard habitat. Students will learn the importance of food, water, and shelter, and begin to understand the different needs of organisms throughout the world.
During this lesson students will explore the role of worms in moving matter through their environment! Through hands-on observation, game based learning, and compost building, students get up close and personal with worms!
During this lesson students will learn about the seasonality of plants in connection to their climate. Students will mimic diverse plant lifecycles through a game, plant summer crops and survey the garden for different plant lifecycle stages.
During this lesson students will get serious about sediments! Through observation and exploration, game based learning, and soil sediment testing, students will get their hands dirty and feet moving to learn more about the earth beneath them.
During this lesson students will learn about the important role that flowers play in plant reproduction and survival. Through flower dissection, pollination games, and related garden work, students learn that flowers create fruits and seeds through the process of pollination!
Students gain an appreciation for the important role decomposers play in food waste recycling through scientific experimentation comparing the way that food waste breaks down in a sterile environment versus with the assistance of an observation worm bin that they make. Participants explore the world under our feet learning about not only what soil is made of but also getting an in-depth introduction to the many inhabitants of the soil. They learn firsthand through scientific experimentation just what would happen without decomposition. Scientific inquiry is the start of the STEM subject areas for this unit, though applied mathematics through measurement of samples, use of technology, and basic engineering are included.
This is a hands-on introductory course on botany and food production. Starting with seeds, students move through the life cycle of a plant exploring the ins and outs of each plant part. Games, scientific observations, and engineering projects guide students through the learning. As a final project, students will develop and design their own plant with plant part functionality in mind.