Learning About Pumpkins

The life cycle of a pumpkin is one of my favorite things to teach about in the fall.  I get to bring in a pumpkin and do different science experiments with it, we go to the farm to pick a pumpkin, we explore the seeds of a pumpkin...the fun never ends! :)  Before I share all of my photos from this week, I am joining the party, and throwing a weekend SALE in my TpT store, everything is 20% off, Saturday and Sunday!

This is our life cycle of a pumpkin bulletin board.  In the middle, I made a life cycle out of construction paper, and around it, we decorated the board with the students' drawing of the life cycle.

After I taught the students about the life cycle of a pumpkin, we drew the steps together.  I modeled how to write words around our picture to scaffold for students that needed a challenge.  Some of them wrote words near their drawing, and others just drew a picture.

Here are the pieces of the pumpkin life cycle from our bulletin board...

We went on a field trip to the farm last week, and the students were able to point out the different stages of the life cycle as we walked around the pumpkin patch...I felt so proud! :)

Thanks to Miss Kindergarten's Pumpkin Graph and Glyph, we were able to use her unit to help us conduct pumpkin science experiments.  We did two sink or float experiments: with pumpkins and with seeds!

Before I dropped the pumpkin in the water, we made a class graph predicting if the pumpkin would sink or float.  There was also a recording sheet that we showed on our own paper what the results of the class graph were.

The students were so excited as I dropped the pumpkin in the water to see if it would sink or float...the cheer was as if we just won a pizza party!

Once a week we do a science experiment, so the following week we tested if the pumpkin seeds would sink or float.  Again, first we made a class graph, recorded our hypothesis, and then conducted our experiment. 

Each child got a chance to dig into the pumpkin and pull out a handful of seeds {you can imagine how exciting this part was}.

Last but not least, I dropped a handful of seeds into our tub of water to see if they would sink or float!

You can see we had a blast learning about pumpkins and conducting experiments with them!  Make sure you take a peek at my TpT Store for the 20% off sale Thanks Abby for the cute graphic!