Pre-K Scientists Pollinate the Flowers With Bee-Sticks

Today (day 18 of our project) was a big day for our Fast Plants. The children took bee-sticks (dried honey bees glued onto a skewer) and gently moved it (the bee-stick) from flower to flower carrying the tiny pollen which will help our flowers complete their life cycle. After they swirled the bee around for a while, they looked at it under the digital microscope. They were excited to see all of the yellow flecks clinging to the bees body. New vocabulary introduced with this activity: pollen, pollinate, pollination. The children now understand how important bees are to plants and to animals.

Pre-K Scientists at Work

We are in the third week of our plant unit and the children's understanding of what plants need continues to strengthen with each passing day. Their Wisconsin Fast Plant project is in its 10th day, their potato heads have sprouted rye grass hair, some of their beans are now 10 cubes high, they are harvesting lettuce and turnip greens from the Ladybug garden, and today they became "real" scientists. With 5 snapdragon plants in 4" pots, we decided to take away some of the things that plants need: One will go without water, one will go without light, one will be in a plastic bag (no fresh air), one was taken out of its pot (no soil to grow in), and one will have everything (our control plant). Over the next several days, the teams will be looking for changes being brought about by omitting some of their plants needs. They predicted that all but one of the plants will die. We shall see if their hypothesis is correct. Stay tuned:)

PreK Student Plays Violin

Let's Play and Hear Music!

One of our little Ladybugs and her mother played their violins for our class today. The mom, Ms. Hwang, is a teacher at Travis Heights Elementary School in Austin and is a Suzuki violin teacher. It is not surprising that her daughter is learning how to play the tiny violin, which is appropriate for her size. We are learning about sound and our sense of hearing, so it was thrilling to hear the high and low sounds as they plucked the strings. The children were also delighted to sing along to two of their favorite tunes, Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and the ABC Song.

Making and Observing Drops of Water

During our 3rd week of using Exploring Water with Young Children (The Young Scientist Series by Ingrid Chalufour and Karen Worth), the PreK children began to explore an important property of water...that it sticks to itself (cohesion). When the children first saw the drops, they said they looked like rain drops and like little bubbles. They found out that they could move a drop around to join another drop, making an even bigger drop. They challenged their friends to make the tiniest drops. They jiggled the plate to watch the drops jiggle and shake. I notice that it took great concentration and fine motor skills to control the amount of water coming out of the eyedropper. Next the children will make and observe drops on various surfaces, like waxed paper, aluminum foil, plastic wrap, paper towel, and fabric. The children will also be recording their observations in their science journals.