Health and Growth of Plants
On earth there are living and non living things. Non-living things are things that do not grow or cannot move unless something moves it. Our houses are filled with non-living things. Chairs, tables, beds, shoes, clothes, plates, and pans are all non-living. They do not grow, and they cannot move unless we move them. The outside world is also filled with non-living things, rocks, stones, soil, mud, and sand are all examples of non-living things.
Living things are things that can grow, that eat food, and that drink water. The study of living things is a super fun science because living things can react to the environment. Living things do things to the world around them, as well as depend on the world around them in order to live. We humans are living things, so are animals, and so are plants. We all need water to live. We drink water from a glass, animals drink water from lakes and rivers, while plants drink the water in the soil. You may have seen some people watering their plants, they are helping their plants get enough water to grow.
Animals eat because they find or hunt for their food. We humans know how to make our food by cooking it. Plants also make their food, but they make their food inside themselves. They make their food in their leaves. You can imagine that the leaves of a plant are tiny little kitchens that make food and give it to the rest of the plant, like the branches and flowers. The process a plant uses to make food is called photosynthesis, and the production of plant food is also what makes plants turn green.
To keep living things like animals and humans healthy, they need food, water, and the right amount of exercise. But in the super fun science of the plant world, they need water, the food they make, and sunlight! Sunlight helps plants make food through light and heat energy. This is why it is important that our plants get enough sun, especially when they are just starting to grow!
Many plants grow from seeds. These seeds are put into the ground or soil, and after enough water and a few weeks of sunlight, the seed bursts and a plant pushes up from the soil and out into the sun. Some plants grow differently. Some plants grow from bulbs, like onions. An onion is a bulb, and when you plant an onion it will grow!
In the super fun science experiment coming up, we will take care of an onion plant and watch its health. We will take notes on how long it takes for the plant to push a green stalk through the onion, and how fast the green stalk grows. We have to remember that plants make their own food, but to keep them healthy, they need water and sunlight.
