Use All the Senses: Observation 101

Back-to-school and introducing the basics of inquiry-based science.
How to build students' skills of awareness and observation using the senses whether you are indoors or out?
Introduce the senses, including the five senses: sight, hearing, taste, touch, smell and others such as the ability to sense electro-magnetic fields and non-visible light and radiation. Talk about the anatomical adaptations that allow us and other animals to sense our environment and various types of energy.

Here’s some ideas for easy sensory activities for pre-K through 4th grade.

Sight

• Look around the class, look for specific colors
• What do you see indoors?
• What can you see outside through the window?

Hearing

• Read a "sound" poem e.g. Summer Song in A First Book of Nature by Nicola Davies
• Play some notes and music
• Listen to sounds in the classroom. What do you hear: air conditioning, cars, people chatting?

Taste

• Discuss taste and flavor and link to tongue and nose receptors
• If you can, bring in some washed herbs, such as parsley, thyme, sage, mint and rosemary for students to taste

Touch

Materials
Cloth bags or paper lunch bags - to share one bag per child or one bag between two students

Tactile objects one per bag

Preparation
Fill each bag with a tactile object: include some natural found objects such as seashell, pebble, feather, grass seedhead, pinecone. Also add some small treasures such as a piece of textured cloth or a small basket.

Activity

• Give each student a bag and ask them to not look inside
• Invite students to put a hand carefully inside their bag and feel the object and try to guess what’s inside, and describe to the class.
• After everyone has taken a turn, then students take out their object to share other features such as color.

Smell

Materials
10 ½ pint preserving jars with lids

10 cottonwool makeup pads

10 different scents e.g. cinnamon, vanilla essence, lavender flowers, tea tree oil, lemon essence, orange essence, coconut essence, ginger root, peppermint essence.

Stickers numbered 1 to 10

Preparation:

Make sure jars are clean and dry.

Put a small amount of a spice or few drops of  an essence on a cottonwool pad and place in jar.

Put numbered sticker on jar lid and make list to key, e.g. #1 is cinnamon, #2 is vanilla.

Activity

• Put jars 1 through 10 on tables in front of students, with lids off and with numbered stickers up for reference
• Have students list numbers 1 through 10 on a sheet of paper and walk around gallery-style to sniff the jars and describe and guess what is the scent they can smell in each jar
• Which smells are familiar? Which smells do you prefer?
• Refer to your keyed list of the jars and scents if need be

Outdoor Extension for Using All the Senses

How do you feel outside? Is it warm or cold today?
Play a sensory scavenger hunt to look for, see, observe and identify animals and plants in the schoolyard
Shut your eyes and listen - what do you hear now we’re outside? A plane, the wind rustling leaves, people chatting, crickets, squirrels, birds?

Smell the roses or other flowers. Dig up some earth and smell it.

Pick some edible herbs, fruit or vegetables. Remember to wash before you taste or when you return to the classroom.

• Embellish your conversation about the senses with some amazing animal facts from the Neuroscience for Kids website.

This week I facilitated a lesson on Using the Senses with two groups of homeschool students. The students enjoyed the tactile and scent activities, and listening to the sounds inside the classroom and outdoors. Out in the playground we also found several spiders and several vines. The students learned to identify and distinguish between English ivy, Poison ivy, Wild Grape and Porcelainberry and had lots of fun finding acorns.

Next week we’ll study ants!

Resources:

Gardening With and For Kids: Use All the Senses from Mary Van Dyke

• A First Book of Nature by Nicola Davies
• Sensory Scavenger Hunt by Arlington Regional Master Naturalists
• Amazing Animal Senses on the Neuroscience for Kids website https://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/amaze.html