Green beans, another pre-blog experience, from spring pre-k, 2011

After we planted our hardier, cooler weather veggies, I had a packet of green beans which recommended to plant later in the spring.  I decided we could start these indoors, and transplant them.  This helped the kids understand that different plants have different needs, as well as paying closer attention to changes in weather.  I got one of those Jiffy peat pot kits that had 25 pots, perfect for our class of 20.  Unfortunately, I can't find pics of the beginning.

I was setting up/figuring out how quickly the peat absorbed water, which I figured out works much faster with warm water.  I had set one pot in a Styrofoam bowl and had poured cool water in, not soaking up much, I went to the kitchen to get warmer water (can't have hot water hitting little hands!)  My assistant was still in the room, but involved with an activity.  One of my overly zealous students decided to get hers ready as well.  She set a pot in a Styrofoam bowl, and added water...with soap!  As a 'consequence' to her not waiting to follow directions, I informed her that this pot will be hers, and we will continue to water it with soapy water.  She was pretty upset, but I lessened the blown by adding that it will be an experiment.  We can observe the difference in how it grows compared to the others.

Each child got to plant their own bean.  They sprouted very quickly and were growing much faster than the weather was warming.  

Green bean seedlings mid-March 2011

The plastic cup in the middle is holding the 'soapy water' fed green bean.  :)

To the relief of my student, it grew just as well as the others!  I thought about sabotaging it, (oh, the horror!) but that just wouldn't be nice nor good science...hopefully she still learned her lesson in following directions! :)

Because the green beans were growing so rapidly, I decided we needed to take some action.  I reviewed with the kids about why we didn't plant them outside and they agreed that it was still too cold for them to go outside.  This evolved, with no planning(!) into a lesson in gravity! 

Top heavy green beans

The kids observed that one of the plants had flopped over.  I asked them why they thought it fell.  These are some of the 'higher level' thinking answers I got from what I thought would be a 'high level' thinking question:

"P. bent it over!"

"Somebody else broke it."

"It wasn't me!"

"It's not MY green bean!"

"Yes it WAS you!" pointing...

"No, it wasn't!"  tears...pouting...stomping...

Deep breath....sigh...

Must...remember...this...is...pre-k...  :)

Ok, so must 'redirect,' another one of those classroom management terms we hear in training, lol. 

I thought for a second, and recalled Z's new baby sister.  I asked Z why they have to hold her head up.  Finally we were getting somewhere..."Her neck isn't strong enough."  Another kids said, "Her head is too big."  Haha!  Right, and then I asked, "What holds us to the earth?"  "Gravity!"  Ah-ha!  They remembered the extremely fun ping pong ball activity:

Sadly, because it was about to be spring break, we planted them a couple weeks later, then had a couple cold nights, and the poor green beans didn't make it.  Another lesson learned...the hard way.  At least we had enough beans left over and they are now growing well in our summer garden!