Lesson: Colors in the Garden
Author: Sarah Pounders
Overview
Outdoors is where the colors are! This pre-K lesson helps your students explore the spectrum in the garden and schoolyard.
Objective: Play a matching game in the garden to
encourage kids to explore the diversity of nature's colors.
Prep: Punch a hole in your color cards and thread them onto the ring
or ribbon. Make one of these “color keys” for each child.
Laying the Groundwork
Read Planting a Rainbow, and talk about how all
colors can be found in nature. Review basic colors, and give each child
a color key.
Exploration
1. Go out into the garden or schoolyard
and let kids spend some time walking around looking for things
that
match the different colors on their color key.
2. Next, gather as a group and look for colors
one by one. For each item identified ask the following questions:
3. Try to match each color to a plant or plant part.
4. Older kids can go beyond basic colors to talk about the variation
in colors from light to dark. For instance, prepare a color key consisting
of many hues and shades of green, and find plant material to match
each one.
Making Connections
-
Cut pictures of different flowers, fruits, and vegetables from seed
catalogs. Label paper plates as red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple,
and white, using corresponding colored markers or crayons, and then
ask students to sort the pictures onto the plates.
-
Many natural products can be used to make dyes. Make
a rainbow “quilt” by coloring pieces of cloth using natural dyes.
To
make the dyes, let kids crush fruits and vegetables – strawberries,
raspberries, blackberries, cranberries, and spinach (frozen or
fresh) – in bowls with a potato masher, and then add warm water.
Let bowls
sit for 15 to 30 minutes, and then use a strainer to separate out
the pulp. Next dip “quilt squares” (small squares of white cotton
cloth) in the dye. Let the squares dry and then glue them to a
poster board to make a rainbow quilt.
You can get a stronger color
and use a greater diversity of fruits and vegetables by placing
them in boiling water (although it increases
complexity and safety concerns). Additional fruits and vegetables
you can use to make a boiled dye bath include red cabbage, onion
skins, carrots, and beets.
- Eat a rainbow! Many of the pigments responsible for the color of
your fruits and vegetables also provide important health benefits for
us. Rather than trying to remember nutrition particulars about each
fruit and vegetable, many nutritionists recommend that we “eat a rainbow”
of fruits and vegetables to make sure we are getting all of our nutrients.
- Create
a chart of fruits and vegetables representing each color of the rainbow
using pictures from seed catalogs or magazines. Bring
in samples of different colored fruits and vegetables for lunches
or snacks.
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© 2009
National Gardening Association