Obviously there are many many crops that grow on farms, but I decided to focus our attention for this day to vegetables. Read on below to see how we explored vegetables.
Farm Foods Books
We read two stories about vegetables to correlate with our activities for the day: Growing Vegetable Soup by Lois Ehlert and Mrs. McNosh and the Great Big Squash by Sarah Weeks.
Mrs. McNosh and the Great Big Squash was a short, fun book about growing a very big squash. Growing Vegetable Soup was book about growing vegetables and turning them into soup. It had bold illustrations and simple writing that were perfect for a toddler - it's one of my favorite children's books.
Feeling Farm Foods
T really loves going to the grocery store and putting produce into the cart. He enjoys feeling the different textures and feels very accomplished when he puts a fruit or vegetable in the bag (he celebrates this by clapping for himself). I thought since we were exploring vegetables I would branch out a bit and purchase some that I don't normally buy. I got a variety of veggies - cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage, zucchini, parsnips, turnips, celery, carrots, acorn squash and potatoes.
Veggies naturally have a variety of colors and textures, so there is very little effort required to put together this sensory experience. Some older kids participated in this activity as well. I thought they would find it boring but they loved feeling and smelling the vegetables and learning a little about each. For the older kids, we talked about where the vegetable grows (above ground or underground). For the younger kids, we used a lot of descriptive words (smooth, bumpy, soft, prickly, etc) and pointed out colors and the names of the vegetables.
Making Vegetable Soup
It would be terribly wasteful to buy all those beautiful vegetables and not put them to some delicious use. Inspired by Growing Vegetable Soup, we turned our basket of vegetables (plus some additional veggies) into a delicious vegetable soup. T will eat just about anything, so this isn't saying much, but he gobbled it up!