5 Senses - Week 2 of 2 (Taste, Smell, and Touch)

The Fabulous Five Senses

Sense of Taste, Sense of Smell, Sense of Touch

Week 2

This week our focus was on the sense of taste, sense of smell, and sense of touch.

SENSE OF TASTE 

We discussed the many different tastes we experience on our tongues:  sweet, salty, bitter, sour, and spicy.  We gave examples of foods we liked and did not like and how they tasted.  We agreed that we should never taste anything unless a teacher or loved one says it's okay!  

SENSE OF SMELL

We talked about all the smells around us each day.  We talked about how our sense of smell and sense of taste often work together to help us understand whether we like or dislike something.  If we smell something that is unpleasant, we don't usually want to eat it.  Or, if we smell something warm and sweet-smelling, it makes our mouths water.  We sniffed various smells and tried to guess what we were smelling.  Sometimes that is hard to do when you can't see it or feel it!  Our senses really do work well together.

SENSE OF TOUCH

Our Word of the Week was TEXTURE.  Texture is how something feels or appears to feel.  We discussed the following textures:  soft, smooth, hard, bumpy, sticky, rough, sharp, and slimy.  We don't always just use our fingers to feel, we also use all of our skin.  We know when the air is warm or cold, wet or dry by feeling it on our arms and legs and faces.  

We learned a 5 Senses Song and read a short book about the senses of taste, smell, and touch.

Our Centers involved smelling various unmarked tubes and matching them to the correct picture of that scent.  This was pretty hard for many of the children but a lot of fun!  We also had a "Mystery Box" filled with mysterious items that the children could only reach-in and feel (no peeking!) before guessing what the item was.  They had to rely on feeling its texture, understanding its shape and weight, not using their eyes! We realized how hard that was to do.  In some of the younger classes, we did a sweet and salty taste test to experience the difference on our tongues.  The older scientists already understand this difference quite well so we focused on our other senses.  We continued various sight and sound centers using our eyes and ears to complete a task.

Demonstrating the thaumatrope! 
This is an old, optical toy that, when quickly spun back and forth, appears to blend two images together.  The kids enjoyed this very much!

 Our youngest scientists make me smile every day!  They got a kick out of all the funny noises Miss Marion was making to help them use their sense of hearing!

We used Mr. Potato Head to help discuss which parts of our bodies help us with which sense.  Our eyes help us see; our ears help us hear; our skin/arms/hands help us touch; our nose helps us smell; and our tongue helps us taste.  The kids loved this playful approach to the 5 senses.

Exploring mystery eggs (shake and guess what's in it!)

Exploring texture sticks (press onto playdoh and feel textures)

Playing with the music tree which allows us to use our sense of hearing.

Giving Mr. Potato Head all his parts so he can hear/see/smell/taste/touch...

Playing musical instruments is fun for our ears (most of the time)! haha

Back to our 3 year-old scientists during center time...

Suggested books on 5 senses...

5 Senses - Week 1 of 2 (Sight & Sound)

The Fabulous Five Senses

Week 1's Focus:  Seeing and Hearing

Week 2's Focus:  Tasting, Touching, Smelling

This week we talked about some of the ways our bodies help us understand the world around us as young scientists:  our Five senses!  

Sense of Sight

Sense of Hearing

Sense of Taste

Sense of Touch

Sense of Smell

We discussed that sometimes we use just one sense and sometimes we use all five.  For example, when we go on a picnic, we use our sense of taste when we're eating our food; we use our sense of touch to hold our food; we use our sense of smell to smell the tasty food we're eating; we use our sense of hearing to listen to our family or friends eating with us - and the sounds around us in nature; and we use our sense of sight to see what we're eating and where we are going.

We met Sttan - our 5 senses man who helps us remember what the five senses are:
S(ight) T(aste) T(ouch) A(udio or sound) N(ose)

We discussed that our five senses help keep us safe.  If we are crossing the road - always with an adult - we LOOK and LISTEN to see if any cars are coming.  If we are going to eat something fresh from the oven, we touch it before we put it in our mouths and if it's too HOT, we wait until it cools.  We learned that scientists use their senses to be careful in the world around them AND to make fun, exciting discoveries about the world.

WEEK ONE

Our focus the first week of this two-week lesson is on our Sense of Sight and Sense of Hearing.

First, we did a group activity with mirrors.  Every student got a mirror and looked at their eyes.  They located the black circle in the middle of their eyes and learned the WORD of the WEEK:  PUPIL.  It is an opening, actually a tunnel, through which light passes to the back of the eye (to the retina) and allows us to see what is in front of us.  As the colored part of the eye (the iris) opens or closes to allow more or less light in, the pupil changes size.  We demonstrated this by watching our eyes as we turned the classroom lights on and off - we had to watch closely because it happens very quickly!

Our second group experience was to listen to various sounds we might hear in the world around us and to identify those sounds using our ears.  We identified owls, pianos, sneezes, motorcycles, water splashing, frogs, snoring, ducks, and much more.  We learned that sounds are vibrations and that if we listen to a noise TOO loudly, it can affect our hearing permanently by knocking-down and damaging little hair-like structures in our ears.  The kids were fascinated by this!  We understand we can listen to all levels of sounds but it's best not to put any REALLY loud sounds near our ears, and if there is a loud noise by us, we can simply cover our ears.

Our Week One centers focused on sight and sound.  We played a Five Senses matches game.  We practiced drawing with and without our eyes covered.  We used a thaumatrope (simple optical toy) that fooled our eye into believing we caught a frog in a jar!  We listened to various mystery sounds and tried to guess what they were.  We examined x-rays.  We played with various small instruments that make noise.  Additionally, there were fall-related centers for the children to continue exploring.

Our youngest scientists sang a song about the 5 senses and listened to the book, The Five Senses, A Lion's Tale.  They met STAN, the 5 senses man and we pointed out where our eyes, ears, nose, skin/hands, and mouth are.  We listened to fun sounds together and we explored around the classroom using our sense of sight, hearing, and touch.  We got to feel objects that were rough, smooth, hard, soft, bumpy, scratchy, and sticky.  

Book Recommendations: