Picasso Preschooler: Pumpkin Day

I had planned for most of this day to be spent outside but, as weather is known to do, it failed to cooperate so we had to move inside.

It might have been rainy outside but we were all sunny and happy inside, nice and dry and warm.

We had a couple of extra children as well. Elisabeth was out from school and Logan, Ms. P's grandson joined the fun as well.

The children arrived today to find this waiting for them.

The first thing we did was make pumpkin hats

He's happier than he seems. Hated poising for pictures when he first started with me.

We measured and weighed our pumpkin.

First we each estimated how long of a piece of yarn we would need to reach around the circumference of our pumpkin.

Then we each wrapped our yarn around the pumpkin to see who had come the closest with their estimation.

Calleigh, Logan and Elisabeth's guesses were too long. Cooper's was too short and Dexter's came the closest to just right.

We then estimated how many pounds we thought our pumpkin was.

"Our pumpkin weighes thirty-five pounds"

"I think Logan's right, I think it weighs about thirty-five pounds."

"I think it weighs four pounds. It is very heavy. VERY HEAVY."

"It weighs a whole, whole lot of pounds."

"It weighs two-thousand pounds. It's very, very heavy."

Our pumpkin weighed twenty-three pounds.

Now came the time to cut open our pumpkin and see what we found inside.

" What do you think is inside our pumpkin?" was the question. The answers were very interesting and some spot on.

"I don't know what's inside."

"I think there is pumpkin inside."

"I think there is dirt inside."

"I think there are seeds inside. Seeds and guts,"

"I think there is applesauce inside."

Time to clean out all those seeds to find out how many we have.

"Ewww, it feels squishy."

"Ha, it's gooey."

"Ewwwwww!"

Calleigh and Dexter said, "No thank you," when offered the chance to feel inside.

You can't have a pumpkin day and not taste pumpkin, now can you?

First we poured spice cookie dry mix into a bowl.

Then we added a can of pumpkin.

A shake or two of cinnamon

Stir it all together. Drop on a buttered cookie sheet. Bake at three fifty degrees until done.

While our cookies bake we did an art about what we found inside our pumpkin.

Time to count all those seeds

We enjoyed this book about the life cycle of a pumpkin and talked about what our pumpkin seeds would need to grow into a big, fat, round, bumpy, orange pumpkin.

Now to plant the seeds. I bought little plastic pumpkin buckets to plant our pumpkin seeds in. The kids got a big kick out of them.

We made a class pumpkin patch. I took a small pumpkin and cut it in half to place on top of the soil spilling its seeds onto, and covering a few of them with, soil.

We will watch and record all activity going on in our pumpkin patch in the coming weeks.

I sat our pumpkin on the table and let the children paint a picture of it, then asked them what they had learned about pumpkins. Their responses were interesting.

"Pumpkins grow from seeds. The seeds are inside the pumpkin. You have to give the seeds water, dirt, air, and sun and then they grow a pumpkin. Pumpkins are big yellow flowers before they are pumpkins. They are also green before they are orange."

"Pumpkins are orange. They are big and have seeds and guts inside. They taste good"

"Pumpkins grow from seeds. They grow a vine, then a little green pumpkin, then a big yellow flower, then a big green pumpkin, then a big orange pumpkin."

"Pumpkins are big and orange. They have seeds inside them. If you plant the seeds you will get another pumpkin, but you have to put them in dirt and give them water and sun first."