Plants + Seeds Project
Grand section 2022
How it started
In our garden, the sunflowers wilted and dried as autumn wore on. A group of students became curious about the seeds, connecting one of our favorite afternoon snacks to the giant flowers they tended to in the raised beds.
A decision was made to dissect one to find out if the seeds were ready to eat yet. Although they weren't ready, it sparked an interest in drawing sunflowers and one student in the group decided to label our drawings "tournesol" (sunflower).
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From there, the interest only grew! Next, students wanted to see seeds in action, so we decided to plant some to observe in our workroom. At this point, teachers could sense a potential project forming and decided to create a knowledge web — What do we know? What can we find out?
Audio of students and teachers reflecting on what we know and what we want to find out, which led to the creation of the knowledge web to the right.
A project is born! Are all seeds the same?
Teachers observed that about a third of the preschool class was interested in plants and seeds, and we decided to split into groups of the children's choosing to further investigate our respective topics. The new Plants + Seeds Project group decided to paint some interpretations of our answers to their question by checking out some flowers from a local shop. Some students took the idea of painting flowers and seeds very literally, while some added information to what we already knew — water, sun, soil, and bees are all necessary for seeds and plants!
One teacher's observation story
In the afternoon, a small group worked in our multipurpose room to practice their observing and observational drawing techniques with a bouquet of flowers that had begun wilting. Of 3 separate project groups kicking off now, 2 of them will be making a first site visit next week to observe for our Plants + Seeds Project and our Birds Project. Students gathered around with magnifying glasses, paper, and pencils to look at and capture the bouquet.
After about 10-15 minutes of this, we decided to extend the learning by offering painting supplies and one of our easels. Quickly, one of our younger students picked up a paintbrush and, rather than painting the flowers he saw on paper, began to directly paint on the flowers. The only color of paint offered was yellow, as some of the flowers were yellow and some were white. He studiously worked on painting the white flowers to match their counterparts.
As the flowers became more and more yellow, another student was observing and painting them on the easel. She at first practiced her observational representation, then began adding other elements from our earlier discussions of plants, including the sun, stating “Les plantes need le soleil, le sol, and de l’eau” (Plants need sun, soil, and water).
She then worked on adding a yellow bee to the representation; we have spoken at length about the importance of bees to the ecosystem, including to the supply of most of the food we eat. After adding the bee, she began working on a tree covered in small circles as she asked “How do you say pomme (apple) tree? Les abeilles (bees) make the pommes grow.” I recall this fact being discussed several weeks ago when students were wondering why the apple tree that we planted this spring hadn’t yet produced any fruit. Her connection to and recollection of many aspects of plants and their growth, including new questions, made me sure that choosing plants + seeds as one of our project topics was a good move.
Other students also joined in to paint the flowers, both literally and representationally. The desire to continue their observational representations and to interact directly with the plants at the center of the invitation has me looking very much forward to watching the ways this project develops.
Our first field site visit
Students first practiced observational drawing skills with some of our many indoor plants using pencils, paper, magnifying glasses, and clipboards.
Then we headed on a long hike to the foothills with our friends in the Birds Project group to see what we could learn!
Click through the slides to see the learning we encountered
We collected samples and drawings of the seeds and plants we found, and on our return we checked out the plant starts of some of the seeds we'd planted during the planning phase.
Our second field site visit
After further study and planning, it was decided that we should talk to an expert! Thanks to input from families and careful planning from our teachers, we decided to borrow the bus from our sister program Suntree Language Academy to visit the beautiful North End Organic Nursery. A preliminary visit was made by a teacher to help prepare questions and to talk it through with NEON's welcoming and knowledgable owner, and we made the leap to learn more deeply!
Click through the slides to see the learning we encountered
Showing what we learned
After months of lessons and hands-on research and learning opportunities, we wanted to show what we learned! Students worked on a display board over several weeks while the other project groups (Birds Project and Space Project) made their own informative and interesting field site visits to the World Center for Birds of Prey and the Whittenberger Planetarium.
