Each fall, the kindergarten classroom is transformed and decorated with trellises and fall leaves to kickoff their Garden Unit. There are even scarecrows, small bales of hay, and pumpkins inside and outside.
Kindergarteners become botanists as they study plants and flowers. They learn about the parts of a flower such as the root, stem, leaves, petals, and seeds. They learn that in addition to being beautiful, a flower has the job of attracting pollinators (bees) to help other plants grow. As botanists, they learn about some of the things that plants need to grow like water, sun, light, time, and space.
Students embrace the season and turn real leaves into “leave art.” Pumpkins are used to assist in math as kindergarteners count the lines on the outside of the pumpkins, measure the height of the pumpkin with cubes, and hypothesize whether a pumpkin would sink or float. There are always surprised faces when the pumpkin floats in the large tub of water!
And no Garden Unit is complete without planting the official “Kinder Garden” with little seedlings that the students will tend to and watch grow as their year progresses.