Whether in your own backyard, or in the tropical rainforest, your 5 senses help you learn more about your surroundings. During these lessons, students will begin to discover nature through sight, smell, taste, sound, and touch. After learning about the sights and sounds of their own neighborhood, students will begin to imagine what the environment is like in a lush tropical rainforest.

Lessons

Activity 1: Looking at leaves

Overview: In this section the children will explore different shapes as they learn about the rainforest. They compare shapes that can be found within the rainforest with the shapes they can form with their body and fingers, the shapes within their classroom, and in their own backyard!

Activity 2: Stop and Smell the Flowers

Overview: In this section the children will learn to experience the world through smell, like many animals do. They will learn about the importance of scent to creatures, such as birds and bees, and how even they connect certain smells with certain places.

Activity 3: Sounds of the Rainforest

Overview: In this section the children will learn to use their sense of hearing in order to explore the outside world. They will learn the importance of sound in identifying different objects, both natural and man-made. Then they will get to create their own rainforest concert!

Activity 4: A Rainforest Taste Test

Overview: In this section, the children will explore different tastes while sampling food we eat every day that originates in rainforests. They will chart their reactions to each fruit and make their own rainforest snack.

Activity 5: Get in Touch with Nature

Overview: In this section, children will be introduced to different textures and use the sense of touch to explore the parts of rainforest trees.

Activity 6: Growing a Rainforest in Our Classroom

Overview: After exploring the rainforest through all five senses, students will create a rainforest mural depicting the wonders of this unique habitat. Encourage them to include information on what they would see, smell, taste, touch and hear in the rainforest.

Developed in collaboration with Project Learning Tree.

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