We just got back from our fall break and we are spending our first week back exploring lots of pumpkins in all kinds of ways. Of course one of our favorite things to do is to open up our pumpkins and explore what is inside of the pumpkin…
I don’t know about your students but many (if not most) of my students were not big fans of sticking their hands inside the pumpkins to pull out all the guts. We had to gently coax them along and encouraged them to at least give it a try so we could save up all of our seeds and clean out the pumpkins. We heard lots of “yuck!” comments along the way…
In the end, everyone was up for the challenge and did an amazing job overcoming the yuckies to pull out lots of seeds from all that yucky goo!
I enjoy saving the seeds and giving the children opportunities to explore pumpkin seeds in lots of ways throughout the classroom. Some of the seeds I use are from the pumpkins we have cleaned out but I also buy a few bags of pumpkin seeds so I can get the play started from day one…
This center was our pumpkin seed water play where the children pretend they are making pumpkin seed soup…
The water table is filled with orange water and pumpkin seeds along with ladles, cups, and strainers for play…
Like all of our centers, the children come and go from the water table throughout their time in the outdoor classroom. They pour, strain, pretend to cook, talk, and enjoy the experience of exploring the pumpkin seeds in water…
And the children don’t mind sticking their hands in the pumpkin seed soup!
Available on Amazon