How to Teach Kids About Plants

Give your kids something to explore with this how to teach kids about plants post! This post contains hand painted free printables!

Kids have so many questions about the world and they should! Help them answer their questions about plants with this post. I love going outside and looking closely at the plants growing around me. I love even more doing this with my kids.

Kids seem to soak up anything and everything you have to tell them! I especially love involving kids in my garden. After this post you will be able to discuss the basic plant parts and what they need. I have hand painted some beautiful diagrams that you can print out and use for a great hands-on activity for how to teach kids about plants!

How to use the printables

Print out each water colored picture on how to teach your kids about plants page. Each sheet will come with the labels for the child to match to the correct part on the accompanying page. You can even laminate the plants and labels to be able to use for longer. This is the laminator I use and it would be great for this project.

What do plants need to grow?

One thing I really make a point to teach kids about plants is what they need to live and grow. It is important for kids to understand the needs of things that live around them. It teaches them awareness and selfless thinking. I find it beneficial to let them grow a plant themselves!

What are the parts of a plant?

There are many different parts of the plant. In this post we will be keeping the part labels on a basic level so it can be more kid friendly!

Roots: Hold the plant steady in the ground. They suck up water and nutrients from the soil and even store food for the future.

Stem: The stem supports the plant and carries water and nutrients to the different parts of the plant.

Leaf: Leaves are food factories. Leaves have little openings that let air and water come and go. Leaves catch energy from sunlight and use it to turn the air and water into food.

Fruit: The flower of the plant will develop into the fruit. The fruit protects the seeds.

Flower: Attracts pollinators and makes seeds that will someday grow into new plants.

What is the life cycle of a plant?

Another important thing to teach kids about plants is the life cycle! This diagram below touches on the basics of the plant life cycle.

Seed: Moisture, warmth and air begins the process of germination.

Germination:The seed softens and the root pushes through the seed coat.

Seedling: The new plant grows out of the ground reaching for sunlight. The first two leaves emerge and make food for the plant.

Mature Plant: Six to Eight weeks after germination, the plant reaches adulthood and begins to make a flower.

Pollination: Flowers are fertilized through pollination and seed pods develop.

Seed pod or fruit: The plant produces the fruit (seed pod) with seeds inside. The process then starts over again.

What are pollinators and why are they important?

Pollinators are any animal or insect that visit different flowers carrying pollen from one plant to another. Some examples of pollinators are: Bees, flies, beetles, butterflies, moths, humming birds and some geckos.

They are important because for some plants they cannot complete their life cycle without a pollinator. That means that we wouldn’t get fruit from plants and therefore the plants wouldn’t make more seed pods to reproduce! Pollinators are essential for our ecosystem to survive!

I hope you enjoy working with your kids on these printables. I hope you can enjoy talking with your littles about plants like I do.