Herbology

We had 2 lessons for this class. The first class, the kids painted pots and then chose some flowers to plant in them while learning about various magical plants we had on display (mostly cacti and interesting looking plants from Home Depot). We also attempted to do an experiment where we put white carnations in colored water to make them turn colors, but it didn't work. I've heard celery works better?

 

The second lesson was watering and checking on their plants, measuring them, describing them, etc. Then they learned about mandrakes and put on earmuffs to dig them out. We filled a tiny wagon with dirt and hid the "mandrakes" in it-- the mandrakes were made by cutting up pantyhose and stuffing the sections with brown plastic grocery bags, and then we drew evil faces on the creatures with sharpie. They basically looked like potatoes. We got the idea from here: http://potterpartymania.blogspot.com/2009/10/herbology-class.html and they used ginger roots instead, which is another option. The kids also "planted" some jellybeans, and we intended to put colorful marshmallows on toothpicks coming out of the soil and call them "puffapods," but that never happened.

Some other cute ideas we came across were seed mosaics and making your own tea for Divination class using herbs and spices!

Activity Resources:
Teacher's notes: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_YYwKCxFE1vQ1ZqUllCVXdOR0k/edit?usp=sharing
Colored carnations:http://www.llemonade.com/plants.html
Mandrakes: http://potterpartymania.blogspot.com/2009/10/herbology-class.html
Seed mosaics and tea: http://www.llemonade.com/plants.html