All About Plants

In Term 3, the K1 children were engaged in various activities around the theme “Who do we share the world with?” and the topic “Plants around us”. To involve their families in part of their learning, the children had a take-home activity. They were involved in picking up different leaves or flowers from the garden or park nearby their homes, together with their families. Thereafter, the children were engaged in the following class activity which was conducted at the outdoor area.

The activity was conducted using the five-step teaching protocol which is in line with established theories about how children construct knowledge and acquire concepts and skills. The five steps are Invite Interest, Build on Curiosity, Connect to New Learning, Extend Learning, and Reflect on Learning.

Learning Objectives

Through this activity, children were given the opportunities to:

Draw parts of plants based on observation
Identify the different parts of a plant
Create 2-dimensional artwork with leaves and flowers that were collected and talk about their artwork

Invite Interest

• Ignite children's interest • Tap on children's prior knowledge

This activity began by tapping on the children’s prior knowledge about plants. The children were also given the opportunity to talk about their experiences in the take-home activity, where they picked up different leaves and flowers near their homes with their families and brought them to school.

The children placed all their leaves and flowers that they collected in a container.

Build on Curiosity

• Tap on children's natural curiosity • Inspire children to explore and find out more

The children were interested to explore and find out more about the leaves and flowers which they had collected. They used their senses (sight, smell and touch) to explore the various leaves and flowers. To facilitate their exploration, the teacher also provided simple tools such as magnifying glasses and a plain sheet of paper as background to help them make better observations.

Connect to New Learning

• Help children make connections between prior knowledge and new learning.

After their observations, the children the leaves and flowers that they liked and arranged them on a large sheet of paper. The children observed the leaves and flowers they chose closely, and recorded their observations by drawing them. They then talked about the characteristics of the leaves and flowers with their friends.

Extend Learning

• Help the children apply the skill in different contexts.

From the collection of leaves and flowers, the children also selected some and created an image on paper by putting the leaves and flowers together in creative ways. The artwork represented something that was meaningful to them. After they created the artwork, they about it with their friends. This was also another opportunity for the children to reinforce their understanding about the different parts of the plant as they talked about them in another setting.


Child S made a rescue boat as he likes to play with his toy boat.	Child C created a butterfly as that was her favourite insect.

Reflect on Learning

• Engage children in reflection to think back, learn from it and doit better.

The children reflected about how they used their senses such as their sight, smell and touch to observe the leaves and flowers collected, and draw and create an artwork. Their completed artwork was also displayed prominently in the classroom to provide them with opportunities to revisit their creations.

Conclusion

This activity integrated the learning areas of Discovery of the World and Aesthetics and Creative Expression. The children engaged in hands-on activities as they learnt about the different parts of the plant, and had opportunities to talk about it in different settings, be it from observation or through their artwork. The children were constantly engaging in exploration and having meaningful conversations with their peers and teacher as they constructed their own knowledge through the teacher’s facilitation.

Contributed by:

Geetha D/O V Segar, Senior Teacher

K1 Binjai (2018)

MOE Kindergarten @ Riverside

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