Grades K-3
29 activities – 196 pages

Primarily Plants combines students’ natural curiosity about the world around them with several creative explorations that will lead the young learners to discover basic facts about plants. Activities include soaking a lima bean so it can be opened up to see the parts within it (the embryo is obvious); going on a “Leaf Safari” to collect and compare shapes, sizes and colors of leaves; and manipulating how much sun or water plants receive to observe how that impacts growth.

The hands-on activities – which in some cases are accompanied with little student books that contain illustrations, stories, poems, or songs – explore four major areas:  Plant Growth; Seeds, Spores and More; Plant Needs; and Plant Parts.

Experiences in the Plant Growth section have students dissecting seeds to find the plant embryo and food storage in each one. They plant plastic bag gardens to watch seeds sprout. This not only develops observation skills, but also provides a wonderful opportunity to practice measuring skills by finding the lengths of the sprouts and roots.

In Seeds, Spores, and More, students will explore that plants can come from things other than seeds. They will look at bulbs, cuttings, and the spores on ferns. Students will also investigate different ways in which seeds travel.

The Plant Needs section focuses on what plants require to grow. Students look at plants grown in different soils, with different amounts of sunlight, amounts of space, and temperatures. For each of these experiences, the young learners draw conclusions about what conditions are best for their plants.

In Plants Parts, the structure and function of leaves, flowers, stems, and roots are explored.  Students will carefully observe the different parts of a plant to find why they are necessary for the plant’s survival.