Spring Has Sprung (I hope!)

Started seeds for the big garden and planted some spinach, lettuce and radish in the salad tub this morning. 60 degrees in February, birds singing, wind chimes playing and children laughing. It doesn't get much better! Hopefully, either the groundhog was WRONG, or we'll simply have another 4 weeks of the mild winter weather we've been blessed with this year.

The girls filled the seed trays.

 G tamped. His idea, not mine, but it needed to be done. 

He picked a good tool for it and did an excellent job.

We've just started filling these with basil, lavender, cauliflower, broccoli, brussel sprouts and other cooler weather crops. Another month before we start the warm weather ones.

Cleaned out the sprouting weeds from the salad tub next to the deck, used the cultivator to loosen the soil, and the children planted the seeds. The teeny lettuce seeds got spread out and smoothed into the soil.

 The larger spinach and radish seeds were placed individually and pushed in a little.

SKILLS:
Math big/little, empty/full, counting seed pot openings, sequencing i.e. we have to fill the pots before we plant the seeds/we have to plant the seeds before we water/etc., we divided the salad bin into thirds
Language vocabulary
Science we eat plants, plants need soil/water/light/warmth to grow, soil has food for plants in it, seeds make food for us and animals, we plant seeds, we plant seeds in the spring time here and they grow until summer or fall, farmers grow most of our food, we eat leaves/roots/stalks of plants
Fine Motor scooping/moving/placing dirt into seed pots, placing seeds and pushing them in, covering the seeds with additional soil
Gross Motor balancing the dirt as they moved it from the sack to the container, holding balance as they bent over the salad bin to place seeds

Tags: preschool, pre-k, childcare, daycare, teaching, science, gardening, toddlers, seeds, plants, outdoor play