Preschool Science: Dissecting Vegetables Activity
Are your preschoolers veggie lovers? Although many preschoolers don’t care for eating vegetables, they will all love learning about them in this dissecting vegetables activity. Preschoolers will learn all about the vegetables they eat, including what the seeds look like, how the plant grows, and what part of the plant that we eat.
What makes this activity even more fun for preschoolers is that the little ones can cut apart the vegetables on their own. Little ones will appreciate this extra level of hands-on learning, and the lesson will stick better, too!
Dissecting Vegetables Activity for Preschool Science
Preschoolers will love learning about the parts of vegetables that they eat with this simple dissecting vegetables activity. You’ll need just a few things to make this project work:
- Kid-safe knife (we used a plastic knife)
- Various vegetables (tomatoes, carrots, onion, lettuce, turnip, cucumber, broccoli, and any other vegetables and fruit you have on hand)
Before cutting up any vegetables, show your preschoolers what types of vegetables you have on hand. Discuss how to tell if a plant is a root, seed, or the fruit of a plant. Discuss what makes a plant a vegetable and what makes it a fruit.
Let the kids use their kid-safe knives to cut into the vegetables. Have them look at the peel, roots, stems, seeds, and flesh of each plant. Let them discuss what makes the vegetables alike and what makes them different.
What is their favorite vegetable?
Dissecting Vegetables Activity Explained
Kids will love cutting apart vegetables, particularly if they are not normally allowed to cut up vegetables. During this activity, have kids look for specific parts of each vegetable (seeds, skin, roots, where the flower used to be, different layers, the structure of the flesh, etc.). You could also have the kids cut apart fruit and compare any similarities and differences. Talk with your preschoolers about what makes something a fruit and what makes it a vegetable. Discuss why we’ve decided to call some fruits vegetables rather than fruits. Let children figure out which vegetables come from the fruit of the plant, which come from the plant itself, and which come from plant roots. Preschoolers will have a blast with investigative science like this.
