Plant Sale: Seeding Calendar

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OBJECTIVE

Students will be able to identify the last frost date

Students will be able to record when to seed plant sale crops

ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS

How do I grow food?

What do plants need to grow?

MATERIALS

PROCEDURE

This is the third lesson in the plant sale unit.

Introduction:

Now that we’ve ordered seeds for the plant sale, we have to figure out when the best times to start them are. Explain to students that some seeds take a long time to grow, and some seeds are quick. Ask students if they can think of any examples of a seed that takes a long time to grow (tree, corn, or squash) and a seed that grows really quick (lettuce, radish). 

Let them know that we will make a calendar to help us figure out when to start our seeds. Ask students if they use a calendar at home to keep track of important dates.

Activity

You can work on the calendar together as a class with it projected on the screen, or hand out paper copies so that students can make their own version.

The first thing you have to figure out is your area’s last frost date. You can model typing this into a google search on the smart board so that students understand how to find this information. Explain to students that this is the date when we know it will be warm enough for all of our plant sale plants to be outside. Mark the last frost date on the calendar.

Each plant has a recommended date they should be planted based on the last frost. Students should have this information on their Reading A Seed Packet worksheet from the last lesson. If not, you could either have students collect this information onto a worksheet by reading seed packets, or provide the information for them ahead of the lesson. Once you have your compiled list of weeks before last frost dates, pick one of the crops and work together to count the weeks from the last frost it has to be planted. Mark the calendar accordingly. Work through each crop until the calendar has all of the information that is needed.

Explain to students that this is how farmers and gardeners stay organized for the growing season. We will now use this calendar to know when to plant each seed so that it is successful.

Wrap Up/Assessment: 

Students can store their seeding calendars in their cubbies to use every week for plant sale seeding. Have them take their calendar out for garden time, find the date and use their calendar to figure out what is being seeded this week.

FOLLOW UP/EXTENSIONS

MA CURRICULUM CONNECTIONS

Science Technology/Engeneering