Saturday, November 9, 2013

Pumpkins galore

Ever since our pumpkin patch field trip we have been having all kinds of fun with pumpkins - doing pumpkin math, reading pumpkin books, cutting open pumpkins to see what's inside... Here are a few of our pumpkin adventures we've been having!

Investigating a Pumpkin
First we shared our observations about the outside of a pumpkin, and recorded our observations in our science journals. (My favorite descriptive word was "squiggly.")




Then the next day we opened up the pumpkin to see what was inside! Most of the kids were excited to stick their hands in there, but a few wanted nothing to do with that squishy mess. We estimated how many seeds were inside, and then counted them by tens. We ended up with 297!




Then I took the seeds home to toast them, and we ate them the next day! One student also brought in her own pumpkin seeds, and another brought in pumpkin cookies. Kindergarteners can never get too many cookies.



Pumpkin Math
We did lots of fun pumpkin-themed activities at math center time, including making jack-o-lanterns with pattern blocks...


measuring how tall we are using pumpkins and apples...


and measuring Ms. Breuer too!



We also did a fall-themed "Count the Room" activity where I hid cards with varying amounts of pumpkins, acorns, or leaves on them. The kindergarteners' job was to find the cards around the room, count how many items on each one, and record that number.

  



Pumpkin Fun
We decorated paper pumpkins with glitter, sequins, stickers, and googly eyes. And we got a brand new pumpkin patch in our dramatic play area, where the kids can buy and sell pumpkins, draw on a real pumpkin (with washable markers - the waxy surface on the pumpkins allows it to wipe right off - this was a huge hit!), and read autumn-themed books.






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