Why do leaves change colour?

When you get asked a question like this you know it's going to be the basis of your lessons.

We started with a little hands on activity - I asked 'what colours are the leaves in autumn?' and I laid them out on the mat as they called each colour out (if you look closely you'll notice that the green, yellow and orange leaves are all the same shape - you'll need this for the next step)

next I laid the same shaped leaves on top of each other (green, orange then yellow) and asked if they knew why leaves were green - once they came up with chlorophyll as the answer we discussed how the days are shorter in autumn so the leaves make less chlorophyll and eventually stop (lift the green leaf off)

when the chlorophyll runs out you see the orange and yellow of the leaf - those colours are always present but are hidden beneath the green.

Next we discussed the red leaf - the red colouring happens if glucose is trapped in the leaf when photosynthesis stops.

Brown is from waste left in the leaf.

Lilly and Sunflower wrote this up for a poster (using some leaf prints from the other day)

while they did Rose and Tulip tried a leaf matching activity

and looked at the parts of an apple (from Montessori Print Shop)

When they had finished we all worked on some leaf types 3 part cards

looked at a leaf skeleton whilst learning the parts of a leaf.

To finish we used the parts of a leaf 3 part cards (Absorbent Minds) 

and labelled the parts on a leaf rubbing

I'm linking this to

Montessori Monday

Afterschool Party

Living Life Intentionally