Beans and how they grow

The students will incorporate computer skills, math, and literature with books such as: Miss Rumphius and The Reason for a Flower.

A lesson plan for grade 3 English Language Arts and Science

By Betty Black

Learn more

• The Great Plant Escape gives students the chance to learn each plant part and will enhance the discussion of the function of each plant part
• Plant Parts Salad students can use parts of a plant to create a healthy salad

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• Green Wilma is missing!: This lesson is designed to be used after students have been exposed to animal classification, especially the characteristics of amphibians. Reading Green Wilma by Arnold Lobel and inviting students to respond through art and written expression is a good use of integration.
• Animals undercover: Students will learn about the different animal coverings using the inquiry method. They will learn about how the covering is used for protection and to control body temperatures.
• First class butterflies: This is an integrated unit on raising and releasing Painted Lady butterflies. Students will learn that technology is very useful in obtaining and sharing information about butterflies via the internet.

Related topics

• Learn more about biology and life science and science.

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Learning outcomes

Students will:

• Recognize the parts of a plant and their functions.
• Investigate and explore the development of plants.
• Use oral language skills to describe plant growth.
• Use a computer to open a Microsoft Word document and label the parts of a plant in a text box.
• Save the documents and then retrieve them for publication.
• Determine that new plants can be generated from seeds.

Teacher planning

Time required for lesson

45 minutes

Materials/resources

• teacher-created Microsoft Word document
• Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney
• The Reason for a Flower by Ruth Heller

Technology resources

• computer with internet access
• teacher-created Microsoft Word document with a picture of a plant where students will label the main parts of a plant and then save this document for later retrieval
• paint program for painting plant illustration or a program like Kid Pix for drawing their own plant with parts labeled

Pre-activities

Students should have previously planted bean seeds, monitored their growth, documented their growth, and finally evaluated the relationship between growth and needs (proper light, water, soil, warmth).

Students should have used a variety of resources prior to this lesson which will give them a background of knowledge on plant life: textbook, literature books such as: The Magic School Bus Plants a Seed and The Tiny Seed, and a Reading Rainbow video: Once There Was a Tree.

Activities

1. Read orally the literature about seeds by reading Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney and/or The Reason for a Flower by Ruth Heller to class. Promote discussion about seeds as the book is being read.
2. Continue the discussion about seeds by asking, “What happens when you plant a seed?” (Students should be able to use their background of experiences from when they planted their bean seeds to talk about the life cycle of this bean plant: germination, growth, seed creation / reproduction, and fruit production.)
3. Tell students, “We are going to do a web hunt to investigate the parts of the plants that grow from the seeds.”
4. Use the following internet sites to introduce students to the parts of plants:
   • Plant-Parts Salad use plant parts to create a healthy salad.
   • Great Plant Escape for doing research about the life cycle of a plant, plant parts, and their functions.
5. After discussing the parts of a plant and their functions, students can label the parts of a plant using the attached document: Parts of a Bean Plant. Students should open this document from a diskette or the saved location on their classroom computer. Then they will label the parts of the plant in the text boxes. They should then save the document under a new name. Print this document after the parts have been labeled. This document can be retrieved later for using in a paint program as specified in the next step of this plan.
6. Using “Paint” or any other paint type programs, have students color parts of the plant. They will use the plant graphic in the Microsoft document: select the graphic by clicking on it to get the anchors or handles, and then go to edit and copy this graphic. Then they should open up their paint program and go to edit-paste, pasting this graphic into this application. Using the paint tools they can now color/paint this illustration. Finally this can be printed. Refer to this example.
7. Finally, students can go to Quia-Plant Parts to match plant parts with the correct definition.
8. Optional Activity: Students could use Kid Pix Studio Deluxe to draw a plant and then label each part.

Assessment

Informal Assessment: Sharing of work done in class and an informal inventory by teacher as class discussion occurs as texts are being read. Teacher will mentally note what the students can recall from their bean planting activity.

Formal assessment: Parts of a Plant Activity Page.

Computer Activity with “Paint” or any other paint program.

Supplemental information

The Magic School Bus Goes to Seed video is an excellent resource for this lesson. It could be used as a pre-activity and then later shown again as reinforcement for the concepts taught in this lesson. Students enjoy watching any of the Magic School Bus videos over and over.

Attachments:

• Parts of a Bean
• Bean Painting