Growing Plants

Learning about variables by growing plants

Throughout the month of September, third graders at Justina Road Elementary are studying plants. They are about to begin a project where they plant a seed in a plastic cup and decided on a variable - either water/no water or light/no light. They will monitor their experiments and record observations daily.

The experiment (if you want to give it a try)

Provide two plastic cups filled with potting soil and soaked bean seeds to each pair of students. Label the cups with both students' names. Have students discuss how to set up a fair test to find out what bean plants need to grow taller. What needs to be kept the same in everyone's cups? What could we change on purpose, such as water/no water or light/no light? During discussion list the conditions to keep the same, such as the number of seeds, depth planted, and kind of soil. Each pair of students should choose whether to give their seeds water and no water or light and no light. Label cups accordingly to what each pair of students decide for their variable to be. All students need to decide on the amount of water to be used and a watering schedule (except for the "no water" cups). Cups in "no light" will be kept under a box or in a closet.