The first week of our Growing Gardens theme is all about Planting the Garden. We learned that we first need soil. What can we find in the soil?

We scooped soil indoors in the sensory table…

and outdoors in the garden. Digging, scooping and pouring allows children to explore, using measuring skills and work on their strength as well has eye hand coordination. Nothing like getting dirty!

Growing Gardens: Planting the Garden

At the beginning of each month, we practice writing our names on our nametags. Of course we practice our names all the time, but the nametags are put on our wall in the circle time area and used for letter activities at circle time or for transitions. At the end of the month I make sure they are dated (month/year) and put them in the child’s portfolios. Then we see throughout the year how their name writing has progressed! A simple way to assess their development with Mother Goose Time.

While at the counter, writing our names, the children took turns doing a little dirt writing. Question for this activity: How does soil feel? They were encouraged to feel the soil, write one of their letters in it or whatever they desired.

Next we did some planting! The Growing Gardens kit included some plastic cups, grass seed and soil to plant.

Also included was a observation sheet where the child could draw a picture of what their grass cup looked like everyday. Unfortunately, we planted these just before the weekend. Then day 2 looks very much like day one…so we didn’t do that part, but on Monday when my group came back, they were excited to see grass seed sprouting! It’s always very exciting. As you can see, our grass is growing very well and needs a clipping!

What’s in the garden?

The Theme Poster and Looking Glasses set is always popular at the beginning of a new theme. We use it all month and it gets looked at throughout the day during play.

Discuss: What lives in the dirt? Explore: Invite children to go outside and search for treasures in the dirt. Can they find something living? Non-living? (We didn’t do this right away, but there was opportunity to later in the week.) Play: Invite a child to choose a Looking Glass and find that object on the Theme Poster. Encourage her to count how many there are of that item on the poster. Flip over the Looking ass and follow the directions. Repeat until each child has had a turn. <<< Mother Goose Time allows for each child to learn in many different ways.

These are the daily topic posters for each day of Week 1 Growing Gardens. So much to cover! We love these real, up close and wonderful photos that we reference again and again! They can also be saved and made into a wonderful book for the children to review what they’ve learned.