Cactus gave me an Owie

My son loves gardening with me. He touches the brightly colored flowers, feels the earth splashes water & soaks in the Sun. But today he touched the Cactus :(. He exclaimed how come this has thorns, I never got hurt touching the leaves. Thankfully he did not get hurt a lot but it was time to learn about Cacti!

A Cactus is a type of desert plant that has thick leafless stems which are covered in prickly spines.

Why don't they have leaves like the other plant asked my inquisitive little man?!?!

Since they grow in deserts mostly these Spines help them not to lose water & in process keep them cooler. They are also there to prevent the Animals/ birds from eating them.

The other plant is called a Money plant. It is a type of a Climber plant. These kind of plants use a wall or other plants to support their growth. This way they don't spend energy on growing supportive tissues.

After learning about the basics of the two plants it's time to visualize it by doing a hands-on activity!

Materials needed:

• Play Doh (Green,Pink,White& Brown)

• Play doh cutter

• a few grains of Rice

Steps:

1. We kept our plants in front of us and used our play doh set to match the colors.

2. We rolled some pink play doh for the pot and green play doh for the cactus. The brown play doh was broken into little pieces to show soil.

3. We used the Rice particle to show thorns on the plant.

Learning points from this lesson

• Cactus have thorns to prevent loss of water to thrive in a desert

• Money plants are climbers & use other plants to grow

• When the child picks up the rice particles for the thorns, they practice using their motor skills.

Don't forget ... don't touch a Cactus with your bare hands!