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Farm Science Ideas
Examine Feathers
If you can
obtain some feathers, allow your children to examine the
feathers
with a magnifying glass. You can purchase some at craft stores.
Floating Feathers
Allow the children
to put feathers in a bucket of water to see if they float.
Homemade Butter
Per child you will
need one baby food jar, clean marble, one Tablespoon of heavy
cream or whipping cream. You may desire a pinch of salt and a
drop of yellow food
coloring too. Turn on some fast tempo music and begin shaking
The butter
will form a ball in the jar. Pour off the buttermilk and serve
the butter
on small pieces of toast or crackers. Children can also sample
the buttermilk.
For a little variation, add
honey or sugar & cinnamon to your butter.
To speed up the process you can add a marble to the jar
when shaking.
Cow Milking
Position two chairs
facing one another. Place a broomstick or dowel rod between
chairs.
The broomstick or dowel should be at child's eye level when the
child is seated.
Secure stick with yarn or rope. To make chairs look like cow,
make a cow face and
tail out of construction paper and yarn. Fasten them to opposite
chair backs.
Fill the rubber glove with powdered milk solution. Do not fill
to the top; allow room
to close the top of the glove (secure tightly with heavy rubber
bands.)
Attach glove to center of stick with heavy rubber bands so it
has some bounce.
Carefully put small pinholes in fingers of glove. NOTE: This
step may be delayed
until the lesson is ready for presentation. Place yellow and
brown tissue strips
on the floor to simulate barn floor. More than one cow may be
needed, based on class size.
Tell children it's early morning and it's time to milk the cow.
Put on a straw hat,
pickup the stool and bucket, and say the farmer needs the bucket
to catch the milk
and the stool to sit on. Go into the "barn" area to the "cow."
Sit on the stool,
placing the bucket beneath the "udders." Gently squeeze a squirt
of "milk" into the bucket.
Have children take turns playing the farmer.
Dairy Products
List products made
from milk. List each item on a paper with a pic and the word
YES and NO next to the item. Ask children to taste each item and
circle YES or NO
if they liked each item or not. (HOMEWORK IDEA: Ask each child
to bring in a food product made from milk and then do this
activity.)
What Happens When You Shake
Cream?
Before you begin
this experiment, discuss the terms observation, solid, and
liquid with the children. Also, explain that milk comes from a
cow and cream is part of milk.
Seat the children in a circle. Pour 1/2 pint of heavy whipping cream (not
ultra pasteurized)
into a plastic container with a tight fitting lid. Prepare an
observation chart and note
on it the color and consistency of the cream (white liquid).
Have each child shake
the container a few times and then pass it around the circle. After the
container has
been passed around the circle one more time, open it and
observe. Note changes
on the chart (bubbles, thicker). Keep passing the container
around the circle for each
child to shake. Keep opening it to observe changes. Record the changes
on the chart.
Ask the children the following questions. How does it sound
when you shake it?
What does it look like? What color is it? Is it a liquid or a
solid? The changes
will go from cream to whipped cream to butter; from white to yellowish;
from liquid to solid to solid to liquid (butter and whey).
Note all
the changes on the chart so that you can read it with the
children.
Milking a Cow
Have a local farmer
bring a cow to the school and tell the
children all about it. Let the children take turns milking the
cow.
BE SURE TO CLEAR
THIS WITH PRINCIPAL/DIRECTOR AHEAD OF TIME AND
FIND OUT ABOUT ALLERGIES, ANIMAL FEARS THE CHILDREN MIGHT HAVE,
SAFETY ISSUES FROM THE OWNER, ETC.
Grow a Carrot
Select a
carrot that still has green leaves and stems attached.
Cut the carrot about two inches from the top. Cut off all the
wilted leaves
and trim the stems back to one inch. Place the
carrot top in a shallow
bowl with the cut end down. Place
pebbles around the carrot and then
fill the bow half full of
water. Set the bowl in a sunny window. New sprouts will appear
in
about a week. Once the carrot has sprouted, plant it in some
soil and enjoy watching it grow!
Playground Garden
Set aside an area of
the playground for a garden. Let your children dig in the dirt.
Help them plant flowers and vegetables (radishes, carrots, and
lettuce grow quickly).
Provide watering pots so they can help
water the seeds and plants. If you don't have space
on the
playground, let your children plant seeds in long window boxes
placed on the ground.
Duck Feathers
Ducks love to swim
even in cold weather. Their feathers are special to help them
float
and stay warm and even fly quickly away if they need to. Try this
experiment. It can be
done at Circle time or in a center. Provide a piece of wax paper
and a piece of paper
towel and a glass of water and eye dropper. Have the child drop
water on both pieces
of paper. Ask how can we dry these off? The water has beaded up
on the wax paper so
it's easy to blot up. Explain ducks feathers are like wax paper
the
water will bead up and then they can shake it off.
Duck Feathers II
Collect Duck
feathers from the local park or petting zoo. Show your children
how the feathers
repel water by putting them on the table and squirting a small amount of
water on them
Duck Body Parts
Show the children
pictures of Duck body parts (bill, wing, webbed feet, and
feathers.)
Float & Sink
Make two laminated
charts, each with a blue water line. On one chart, draw a picture
of a duck
on top of the water. On the other, draw a picture of an anchor
under the water. Children put
items in a tub of water to see if they sink or float and then
place them on the appropriate chart.
Horse Food
Bring in and discuss
the types of food horses eat. Compare the types
(grain, alfalfa, hay, apples, carrots) to the nutrition of the
basic food groups.
Which horse food acts as human dairy or meat groups?
Sheep Wool
Place various types
of wool on a table for the children to observe. Included may be
wool clippings,
lanolin, dyed yarn, yarn spun into thread, wool cloth, wool
articles, such as mittens and socks.
I bring in several
different types of wool for the children to feel the differences.
Each breed of sheep
produces wool that may be softer, coarser, crimpy etc. There are
also naturally colored sheep.
The children usually think of sheep as white. It is a very
tactile experience for them. I also expose
them to different type of fur, rabbit, mink etc (anything that I
can get as a comparison).
Make the connection between sheep, wool, yarn and sweaters. There
are books about taking
the fleece and ending up with a sweater. I brought raw wool into
the class, they had to hand card it,
then spin it, then knit it ( had lots of help with these steps).
They realized that it took
lots of work to make 1 garment. (it helps that i spin and have
these resources handy)
Wool & Feathers
Add wool and
feathers to your sensory table during your farm theme.
What Lambs Eat
Another thing that
we do is put toy lambs in the sensory table with real vegetables,
etc.
that they may eat. The children loved to have the lambs eat the
food.
Planting Seeds
Let
children plant vegetable seeds or grass seed in milk cartons.
Muddy Feet
We made some mud in a large under the bed
Rubbermaid storage unit
and had
the kids walk barefoot thru it while holding our hands. They were
to walk
across the length of the tub squishing it between their toes and
explaining
how it felt to them.
How Cows Give Us Milk
Discuss how cows give us milk. Take the children on a field
trip
to a dairy farm so they can get hands on experience milking a
cow.
Pre-K Fun Theme Pages are
for educational reference only!
No copyright infringement is intended.
I do not claim any of these as my own ideas.
They are shared from friends and fellow group
members.
Thanks for sharing all your great ideas!
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