- assorted leaf and root vegetables
- bowls
- leftover vegetables from the week
- pictures of vegetables
- plastic knives
- salsa, guacamole, or nachos (optional if on hand)
- vegetable grater (teacher use only)
- leaf
- root
- vegetable
MA Standards
Language/L.PK.MA.6: Use words and phrases acquired through conversations, listening to books read aloud, activities, and play.
MA Draft Standards
Life Sciences/From Molecules to Organisms: Inheritance and Variation of Traits/LS1/3.C: Use their sense in their exploration and play to gather information. [Structure and Function]
Head Start Outcomes
Logic and Reasoning/Reasoning and Problem Solving: Classifies, compares, and contrasts objects, events, and experiences.
Science Knowledge/Scientific Skills and Method: Observes and discusses common properties, differences, and comparisons among objects.
PreK Learning Guidelines:
English Language Arts/Language 2: Participate actively in discussions, listen to the ideas of others, and ask and answer relevant questions.
Science and Technology/Living Things and Their Environment 15: Use their senses of sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste to explore their environment using sensory vocabulary.
Explore Together (indoors): Leaf and Root Salad
© Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Department of Early Education and Care (Jennifer Waddell photographer). All rights reserved.
STEM Key Concepts: Many foods that animals, including humans, eat come from plants; We eat certain leaves, roots, fruits, and seeds
ELA Focus Skills: Listening and Speaking, Vocabulary
Review vegetables with children and use all the vegetables from the week to make a vegetable salad to eat.
Spread out the vegetables and ask children to recall what they have learned about the vegetables during the week. Ask them to show you leaves and roots, tell what they know about how they grow, and describe how the vegetables taste. Explain that you would like them to make a salad with the vegetables.
Gather children into small groups to discuss and compare the vegetables. Encourage them to talk about what the vegetables might have looked when they were growing, how they are similar or different from plants they have been exploring indoors and outdoors, etc. Help children tear the leaves and break apart stem pieces. Grate pieces of vegetables for children to put in their salads.
Reflect and Share
Before children eat their salads, gather all groups together and discuss what different plants each group had to work with. Encourage children to describe each vegetable and say which part of the plant it is. You may want to have pictures of the vegetables on hand so children can use them as a reference. If you have salsa, nachos, or guacamole, you can include these as part of children’s snack time along with the salad.