Nutrient Experiment
Ages 4-5 (one 30-40 minute session)
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Objectives:
- To help children understand what nutrients are and their importance to plant growth.
Materials:
- 4 week old seedlings
- 3- 4” plastic pots
- 3 plastic pot labels
- All purpose, nutrient free, potting mix
- Water
- Miracle grow
- Clear glass jug
- Plastic funnel
Set up:
Plant an overabundance of seeds in all purpose nutrient free potting mix. Grow for 5 weeks with nothing but water. This will encourage plants to take on a light green starved appearance.
Part One:
Start out by talking to children about what plants need to grow. If possible, look out a window at healthy grass. Call the color of the grass to their attention and have them compare the color to the plants you brought in for the experiment. Talk about what the plants outside have compared to the plants indoors. Suggest the reason for the light color may be nutrient related and talk about what nutrients are. Talk about what would happen if they were only allowed to have water and no food, the perfect amount of food, and too much food. Discuss the same situation with plants and have them speculate on what might happen if the plants were subjected to those conditions. Propose an experiment. Write down their answers in their experiment journal.
Part Two:
Have the children fill one pot apiece. Have them transplant one of the starving plants into their pots after you demonstrate proper transplanting techniques. Put a tag in each pot with the childs name that planted it and label it #1, #2, or #3. Explain that each child is going to feed their plant differently. One will give their plant just water and talk about how water doesn’t have hardly any nutrients in it. One child will give their plant the perfect amount of fertilizer water (show them the directions on the box and mix it into a glass jug so they can see the color change). Finally, the last child will give their plant too much fertilizer (add 6 or 7 times as much fertilizer to the water as on the directions). Call the color change to their attention and talk about what might happen to the plant that gets way too much food.
Part Three:
Put the plants in a sunny window and monitor the changes that take place and help them log their observations.
Questions to ask:
- What’s the difference between the plants outside and the plants inside?
- What do we need to do to keep them healthy indoors?
- Why are these potted plants so light green?
- Do we have too many in a pot?
- Why did that affect them?
- What is in the soil we buy in a bag?
- What is fertilizer?
- Will the plant we give too much fertilizer grow as big as the bean stalk in the story Jack in the Bean stalk?
