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I'm Colleen, and I teach preschool
in a Head Start classroom.
My assistant Kelly and I have 18 preschoolers,
ages three to five years old.
Christine's plant journal.
And we're going to open it up to the first page.
So what does your bean look like?
Could you draw it for me? - Yes.
- When children are doing science, it's really important
to document their work.
This way they have something they can look back at
and reflect on later.
And that deepens their learning.
We're documenting our exploration of plants and seeds
by keeping plant journals...
There you go.
Awesome!
Taking photographs both inside and outside...
This is a picture.
Making a photo chart of growing plants...
You think it's going to grow?
- Yeah.
- And recording the children's observations.
In here we have some beans.
Now we're going to plant.
I will often ask our children to think
about the different ways we can show what we're learning.
I really want to see our plants grow.
Darlene, what do you think a good way
for us to document that would be?
- We could take a picture.
- That's a great idea.
And we can write what we see in the picture?
I'll ask this question even if I have a plan in mind.
I want them to form the habit
of asking this question for themselves.
The important thing is to get them thinking.
And then what else could we do?
- We could draw our plants.
- We can draw our plants.
Drawing pictures is a great opportunity for the children
to make careful observations.
What parts do you see?
- I see a root.
It's right there.
- I talk to them about their work and ask questions
to help them make sense of what they're observing.
What's this?
- A leaf.
- Plants grow.
- What are you drawing right now?
- That's the soil.
- That is soil.
An important part of our work together is to make predictions.
- My plant is going to grow 100 days.
- You predict your plant's going to grow 100 days?
Whether it's at a learning center, circle time
or a facilitated activity,
we'll ask the children to predict what will happen
and then we'll record their predictions so we can
follow up on them.
Here's our plant chart.
To track the growth of our plants from day to day,
we took photographs and we added them to a chart
to show three weeks' worth of observations.
I'll take turns reflecting on the chart
with different children in small groups.
What do you notice about the grass?
- It's little.
- And then what about in here?
- It's big.
- So what's it doing?
- It's growing.
- It is growing.
It's growing right out of the cup.
How did it grow?
- It was a week, right?
Three weeks, and then it grow.
Because it got lots of sun, it got water,
and it drank the water and it grew up.
It grew up.
- It did grow up.
And I like how you got taller
because our plant has gotten taller too.
All the ways we document their work helps the children
make discoveries and become more aware of what they've learned.
And it gives me a better sense of their thinking as well.
Which helps me plan future explorations.