Examining Flowers

This week in the Summer Challenge was backyard science. Expect a couple of posts on our fun this week, but I wanted to talk about activities we did with flowers in our garden. I looked on the internet and found a flower diagram that highlights the parts of a flower. I printed it out and then picked a lily from our garden. Using scissors I helped dissect the flower. Then looking at the diagram "A" drew lines to match what he saw from the internet print-out to what he saw. Then we talked about the boy part of the flower and the girl part. Being only five, I didn't go into to much further detail, but I did go over the vocabulary. Then "A" had to write the word petal and stem after identifying them. I am trying to encourage him to sound out the words and not worry about misspelled words, but he is a perfectionist and will only write if he has the correct spelling.

"A" gets a closer look at a flower!

After the science observation, it was time for some art fun! We went on a flower hunt in our front and back yard. We found about 12 different flowers and brought them in the house to make pounded flower prints. I got the idea for the craft at Family Fun. We placed the flowers on watercolor paper and then a paper towel over them. Then we used a mallet (you can use a hammer) to pound at the flowers. When the paper towel is saturated you can peel away the paper towel and flower and a imprint is left behind on the paper. Observations: Pink flowers leave purple imprints, not all petals leave prints behind (roses for example), and I  thought there was more detail of the leaves and petals on the paper towels than on the paper- which was a little disappointing. That being said, we loved this craft. If you have further observations or suggestions please let me know. "A" loved pounding away and I have to admit so did I. I also think it left a whimsical design that is very soft and pretty. It was interesting to see which flowers worked best and trying other things-like leafs and plants. I may go further and identify the flowers used, but at the same time I may just keep it a beautiful piece of art!

Pounded Flower Prints

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