SHARED By: Wendy Berenson, Three’s Teacher at Early Learning Foundations Preschool

Spring is in the air and all around us we see the trees budding, bulbs popping, flowers flowering and the grass getting green. The children are learning that most plants, flowers and trees start out as seeds. We talked about the three most important things that plants need to grow: water, sunlight and dirt.

We wanted the children to witness how a seed germinates, takes root and starts to grow; so began the lima bean science project.

Lima beans are fast and easy to grow. This is a very simple and visual way for a child to learn the process of germination and see how a seed becomes a plant. It’s also a fun counting exercise for the children.

We set this up as a group activity and had all the children sit around the table. We gave each child a zipped plastic bag and plastic spoon. We filled two small containers with lima beans and two more containers with soil. The children were instructed to count out five lima beans and put them in their plastic bag. We passed around the soil and counted three scoops of soil and put it in the bag. The last part of the activity was spraying water into the bag and zipping it up.

Since we do not have a window in our classroom, we decided to have the children take their seed home and witness its transformation on a daily basis. We asked them to report back to the class any changes that occur. After one week, we had reports of growth and a lot of circle time discussions about the changes (or lack of changes) with each student’s lima bean seed. This is a fun and engaging way to introduce science to three-year-olds.