Planting Spring Bulbs

Now that we are well into winter it's nice to bring a breath of spring into the room to help us antipate what's to come. Yesterday we planted paperwhite bulbs with the children.

They were intrigued by the puck of compressed dirt that came with the planting kit. We had children pass the puck, investigate it, and guess what they thought it was.

Many children thought it was a wood cookie like the ones we have in our building center because of its colour, texture and smell.

When we added water to the dirt something magical happened!

The children were amazed as the dirt suddenly expanded with the water!

We passed the bowl around so the children could feel the difference between the compressed and expanded dirt.

Next we passed the paperwhite bulbs around. The children thought they looked like onions! We discussed how the roots were on the bottom and the sprouts were on top.

We planted all three bulbs and placed them on a shelf in our room where they will get sunlight. We are encouraging the children to check out the bulbs each day and notice any differences that indicate they are growing. Paperwhites grow quite tall, so once the stems begin to grow, we will place measuring and recording materials near them so the children can record their observations.