The Five Senses
The 5 senses unit/theme is used all
year long in my kindergarten classroom.
Young children learn by seeing, tasting, touching, smelling, and
hearing. I incorporate as many of the
senses in everything that we do to ensure that the children learn in the very
best way. At the beginning of the year we do a small mini-unit on the senses
and introduce them. Then we do other
activities all year that use as many of the senses that we can. This way we are reinforcing our learning and
making sure that we are using our senses to learn about our world, etc.
Some of the
concepts covered by teaching about the five senses are:
People have
five senses: touch, taste, smell, sight, and sound.
People use
their five senses to learn about the world around them.
People have
two ears for hearing.
People have
two eyes for seeing.
People have
a mouth and tongue for tasting.
People have
a nose for smelling.
Our senses
help us to gather information.
Frequently, we use more than one sense at a time to explore and
enjoy the world around us.
Introductory Activity:
Use a simple drawing to
introduce children to the five senses.
|
• |
On the board or a large piece of chart paper, draw a stick figure
without eyes, ears, mouth, nose, or hands. |
|
• |
Ask children to think about the important features that the person is
missing. |
|
• |
Prompt them to suggest that the figure needs eyes. |
|
• |
Follow the same procedure and add ears, nose, mouth, and hands. |
Sight
– You see with your eyes.
Things
might look: colorful, shiny, pretty, speckled, sparkly.
Sight
Activities:
1. Sight Walk:Take a sight
walk and then write a class book about the sights. This can be done during the different seasons
of the school year. The books would be
titled I See Fall; I See Winter; I See
Spring, I See Summer.
2. I Spy: Play the game using items in the
classroom. Be sure to use good
describing words when giving the clues to the items.
3. See the Match (puzzle center): To prepare
for this center, enlarge several photos of different classroom objects and
laminate them for durability. Puzzle-cut
each picture and store them in separate Zip-lock bags and place them in the
center. When a child visits the center
and does one of the puzzles then they can scan the room using their sense of
sight to find the item pictured in the puzzle.
4. What’s
Missing Game: Collect several items and place them in front of you. Have the
children cover their eyes and remove one of the objects. After children have
uncovered their eyes have them decide as a group which item is missing.
5. Mirror Reflections: Have children select a partner and stand facing each other.
One child moves very slowly and the second child copies the movement. Use of
variety of arm, leg and face movements.
Hearing
– You hear with your ears.
Things
might sound: loud, soft, high, low, noisy.
Hearing
Activities:
1.
Sound
Shakers: Fill plastic eggs with a variety of items (paper clips, cotton
balls, pennies, stickers, root, etc,) and pass the eggs around the circle. Have
the students take turns guessing what is inside each egg.
2.
Musical
Instruments: Make an instrument out of a toilet paper roll. Seal one end,
fill it with popcorn, and then seal the other end.
3.
Listening
Tape: Create a tape of several easily recognized sounds (e.g.
doorbell ringing, horn honking, people talking, dog barking, etc.) or ask
children to make some sounds and record them.
Invite the children to find a comfortable place on the ground, and ask
them to lie down and close their eyes.
Play the recording. Encourage children to listen carefully. Stop the tape after each sound, and ask the
children to identify it. After all the
sounds have been identified, have children think of other sounds they have
heard (e.g. paper ripping, children laughing) and add these sounds to the tape
recording.
4.
Sound BINGO: I found a
great free game at the following link: http://www.lessonsense.com/games/soundbingo.html It is awesome and
the kids really like playing this game and I saved money by downloading it and not
having to buy a commercially made one. I
printed the cards in color and laminated them so I can use them each year. I burned the sounds onto a CD so I can use
the CD player in the room to play the sounds for the game.
5.
Listening
Walk: Discuss with children what they might hear on a walk through
the hallway of the school or on a walk outside the building. Take the children on a walk and use a tape
recorder to tape the sounds children hear along the way. When you return to the classroom, have
children listen to the tape. Encourage
them to name what made each sound.
Challenge older children to choose one of the sounds and draw a picture
of its source.
6.
Counting
Sounds Game: Ring a bell or clap your hands several times. Have the children listen for the numbers of
sounds. Have them hold up their fingers
to show how many times they heard the sound.
Vary the activity by making two sets of sounds. Make one set of sounds, wait, and then make
the second set. Then see if the children
can combine the numbers of each set together and show that number.
7.
Hello, Friend: Few sounds are sweeter than the sounds of a familiar
voice. So play this
hearing related guessing game to get your youngsters to use their
sense of hearing. Have
one child sit near the front of the
room, facing away from
his classmates. Silently select
three other students to
address the student seated at the front
of the room. Ask each
of these three students, in turn, to say, “Hello, [insert first
student’s name].” After the three youngsters have greeted him, have the student who was
greeted name the students who spoke
to him. If the listener
makes at least one correct guess, have
the first person he
correctly identifies take his place. If not, select one of the
students who spoke to take his place. If
you’re using this game
during a holiday period, have students
give a holiday greeting
rather than just a simple, “Hello.”
8.
I Know That Voice: If you
really want students to have a blast while
they exercise their sense of hearing, then this idea is the one for you! First videotape several different cartoons or obtain several cartoon videotapes featuring different cartoon characters. Then use a cassette recorder to make an audiotape of snippets of the dialogues from the videotapes, orally assigning each snippet a different number. As you tape each bit of conversation, note the cartoon character who said it. Later replay the audiotape for your youngsters. Have students guess each cartoon character’s identity; then check their responses by referring to your notes. Afterwards place the tape in a listening station with a numbered picture answer key, and encourage youngsters to use the tape independently.
9.
Sounds Like
Fun!: Give your students’
ears a workout by creating this game that starts with something you might have an abundance of—crayon boxes. For this activity, you will need an even number of empty crayon boxes. Identically fill pairs of boxes with different
items such as toothpicks,
pennies, sand, or tacks. Seal each box and cover it with Con-Tact® covering. For self-checking, put
identical stickers on the bottoms
of each pair of boxes with the same contents. To use this activity, have a student shake the boxes
in
an effort to find the box pairs that make
the same sound. Once he has decided which
boxes match, have the student flip the boxes to check his responses.
10.
Marching Fun: March to the
beat of a drum. Teacher beat on a drum slow and then fast. Have the children
move accordingly to the beat.
11. Noise Hide and Seek - Supply each
child with a whistle or a bell. Have one child count to ten and the other
children hide with their instrument. The seeker must follow the sounds that the
hidden children make with their instrument.
12.
Scrunch
Paper Collage: Give the children different types of paper to scrunch up and
glue to construction paper. (tissue paper, kleenex,
writing paper, wax paper, foil, construction paper)
13.
Match Makers: Provide the
children with three or four cans with lids, for example, potato chip cans or
coffee cans, and a box of objects that can fit into the can. Allow the children
to put objects in the cans. Then they shake the cans to determine which cans
make the loudest sound, which cans make the softest sound. Cans
can be ordered from softest to loudest.
14.
Who Has The
Touch
- You touch with your hands, feet, and skin.
Things
might feel: soft, hard, smooth, rough, wet.
Touch
Activities:
1. Mystery Bag: Put a textured object inside of
a brown paper lunch bag and pass it around. Some examples are smooth
rocks, rough shells, fur fabric, or even ice cubes! Ask the children to guess
what they think is inside and describe it according to how it feels.
2. Touch Collage: Use different textures (fur,
buttons, rice, paper, etc.) to create a collage.
3. Touch and Guess: Hide familiar objects in a
bag. Have the students feel items and determine what the item is by touch.
4. Texture game: Place items in a bag to
discover textures (smooth, rough, soft, hard, etc).
5. Touching Patterns: Pattern using
beads which are hidden in a bag. Must use touch to find the correct pattern
bead.
6. Tactile Numbers/Letters Cards and/or Puzzles (teacher made
or store bought): Use these to help
children learn the letters and numbers in a hands-on way.
7. Guess What’s Inside: Fill separate
opaque rubber gloves with different sensory materials (Jell-O, rice, beans,
cotton balls, sand, beads, water, flour, etc.)
(Chill the Jell-O and freeze the ice until ready to use.) Tape each glove securely shut. Then pale each into a resealable plastic bag
to prevent spills. Explain to the
children that they will be feeling the gloves to figure out what it
inside. Invite the children to feel the
gloves and guess what each one is filled with.
Encourage them to use descriptive phrases to tell about what they feel
(e.g., This one feels hard and cold.)
8. Tactile Name Cards: Write or type
in large block letters each child’s name on card stock to create “tactile name
cards.” Cover tables with butcher
paper. Put glue, sand, birdseed, and
cornmeal in separate bowls, and place the bowls on the tables. Give each child a paintbrush and his/her name
card. Show the children how to paint
with glue inside the first letter of their name and then how to sprinkle sand,
birdseed, or cornmeal over the glue.
Encourage children to continue until they have covered all of the
letters. Allow the glue to dry, and then
shake the excess materials off into the trash can. Encourage children to practice saying the
letters of their name as they trace over each letter with their finger.
9. Texture Collage: Have each
child bring in at least one or up to five items of various textures (cotton
balls, burlap, ribbon, sandpaper, etc.) Attach the items to a piece of poster
board and place it in a learning center for the children to touch. Vary the activity by having children classify
the items by texture before attaching them to the poster board. If you do this variation, attach the items by
classification to the poster board.
10.
Textured
Paint: Add various items to tempera paint to give children’s pictures a
fun texture. Add one cup of salt to
make sparkly paint, a few teaspoons of oatmeal to make lumpy paint, sawdust or
coffee grounds to make rough paint, half a cup of sugar to make shiny paint,
and liquid starch to make creamy paint.
11.
Feely Can: Fill an empty
can with fun, textured items (e.g mirror, sandpaper, shells,
grapes, small stuffed animals, cooked spaghetti, etc.) Cut off the end of a sock and stretch the
other end over the opening of the can.
Invite children to reach into the can and feel the items. Ask them to identify each item without
looking in the can.
- “Touch Me” Book: Youngsters
won’t want to take their hands off these books. Begin
this project by asking each youngster to contribute 2" x 4" rectangles
of various textured materials to be made into a book. Provide
additional textured samples. Once your collection of textures
is complete, have each youngster incorporate several into a
booklet. Encourage each child to share his booklet with others and
describe each of the textures it contains.
- Textures Around Us: Challenge your little ones to investigate the
textures in the natural world around them. Divide your students into small
groups, and
have them walk around your school. Encourage students to find something
that looks as though it would have an interesting texture or feel. Before permitting
them to touch the selected item, photograph the group members with the item and ask
them to predict
how it will feel. Then encourage each group member to touch and describe the texture
of the object. Note each group’s description. Find out whether or not students’
predictions were accurate.
When the pictures have been developed, glue each one into a blank booklet and write
the youngsters’ descriptions beneath the picture.
- It’s in the Bag: Using
his/her sense of touch, each youngster can match an unseen item to the picture card that corresponds to it. Make a few small cloth
bags or use old socks for this purpose. Collect some small household items that will fit into the bags or socks
you will use. Make a picture card to represent each item; then place each
item in a bag (or sock) and stitch (or tie) the opening. Place the cards
and the bags in a center. Have students take turns feeling the objects
inside the bags and matching each bag to a picture.
- Crayon Rubbings: Gather leaves and
other objects while taking a Feeling Walk. Make a crayon rubbing by
placing a sheet of thin white paper over one or more objects, rubbing the
paper with the side of the crayon.
You could also do tree bark on trees outside.
Taste
– You taste with your tongue.
Things
you might taste: sweet, salty, bitter, sour.
Taste
Activities:
1. Tasting Graph: Provide different items for your
students to taste; such as pickles, salty popcorn, lemon wedges etc. Have
the students graph their favorite item when they are finished tasting.
2. Tasting Fun: Place small amounts of apple, sugar,
salt, lemon, raisins, etc. in separate paper cups. Blindfold students and have them taste the food in one cup. Have
the students try to identify by taste.
3. My Favorite Food Collage: Supply each
child with a paper plate. Allow the children to look through old magazines and
cut out pictures of their favorite foods to glue on their plates. You can even
laminate the plates and use them as place mats at lunch time!!!!!
4. The Nose Knows:The nose is
responsible for part of the flavor of food. To demonstrate this, blindfold a
person and have that person hold their nose. Give them something to taste such
as an pear or apple slice. Can they tell the
difference between the pear and the apple? Try to distinguish the pear slice
from the apple slice. Other good comparison items are baby foods: they come in
a variety of fruit and vegetable flavors. A test food most kids like is the
jelly bean. Buy several flavors of jelly beans and have everyone try to guess
the flavor (with and without the use of their nose). The advantage of using the
baby foods and jelly beans is that they are have the
same texture. Therefore, the blindfolded person will not be able to use touch
information to distinguish the different items.
Smell
– You smell with your nose.
Things
might smell: sweet, stinky, sour, sweaty, fruity.
Smell
Activities:
1. Scented Play-dough: Make scented
playdough and add Kool Aid instead of food
coloring. The Kool Aid powder will not only
color the dough, but it will make it smell wonderful too! You can also
add extracts such as vanilla, orange, or peppermint to make the dough smell
good.
2. Scented Flower Garden: Have the
students draw a flower garden. Use cotton balls soaked in perfume, cinnamon, mint, etc. for flower centers.
3. What Does Your Nose Smell? (Smelling
Jars/Containers): Place perfume, onions, bread, apples, oranges, vinegar, soap,
peppermint extract, cinnamon, rubbing alcohol, lemons or lemon oil, banana
slices, vanilla extract, aftershave, and
coffee grounds in small jars or empty film canisters. Place the liquid items on cotton balls. Have the students identify
each one by smell and describe what they smell.
They can also separate them into likes and dislikes.
4. Scented Sachets: Have
children make a sachet. Have them place two heart doilies back to
back. Use a long piece of curling ribbon
to “sew the doilies together, leaving an opening at the top. Spray three or four cotton balls with perfume
and stuff them between the doilies.
Then, have the children finish sewing the doilies together and tie a bow
at the top.
5. Scented Paints: Add a few
drops of spices or extracts to your tempera paint that is used at the easel.
For example, add peppermint to green paint, cinnamon to red or brown.
Five Senses Activities:
1. Five senses walk: Go on a
walk outside and collect information for each of the five senses. Graph the data (example, different kinds of bird
calls, different colors of leaves, etc.).
This is a great thing to do for each season to strengthen observation skills.
2. Make a five senses book: Illustrate
book with magazine cut outs. “I can
smell/hear/taste/see/touch _________.”
3. Rewrite Brown
Bear, Brown Bear, by Bill Martin. Adapt to the five senses.
4. Fresh Popcorn: Using a hot-air popper, show
the children unpopped kernels and ask them how much popcorn they think it will
make. Pop the corn in the air popper
onto a large piece of clean bulletin board paper or a very large bowl. Invite children to use a small sup to scoop
out some popcorn. Ask the children what
sense they used while making and eating the popcorn: sight-see unpopped and
popped corn, hear-list o the pop, smell-smell it while it cooks and after,
touch-fell the popcorn as they eat it, taste-taste the popcorn as they eat it.
5. Senses Journals/Books: Staple five
pieces of construction paper together.
On each page write “Things I can _____.”
Complete each sentence with a drawing of a body part to represent one of
the five senses. Help each child cut out
magazine pictures related to the sense of the day. Have him/her glue
the cutouts onto the corresponding page; invite him/her to share hi/her work
with the class.
6. Following Rules (sight, hearing, touch, smell): People need
rules to live together and keep our world safe.
Our senses help us be aware of these rules and warn us of danger. Discuss with the children how we use our
senses to obey rules. For example, our
eyes help us read rules such as traffic signs and warning labels. Our ears help us hear school fire alarms, car
horns, and sirens. Our noses help warn
us of potential dangers such as smoke and chemicals. After the discussion, have the children draw
or cut out pictures from magazines of people using one of their senses to help
them follow rules.
7. Five Senses of Christmas Books (click on
link): This is a book I made for the students to do. To finish this book have the students add a
piece of holiday wrapping paper and a bow to the present page, cotton balls to
Santa’s beard, candy canes to the candy cane page (after they have tasted one),
jingle bells to Rudolph’s collar, gingerbread or ginger spice to the
gingerbread man, and color the heart to represent love.
8. Five Senses Scavenger Hunt: Have your
youngsters take a five senses scavenger hunt in your classroom. To prepare for a scavenger hunt, bring 10 to
15 different items that easily lend themselves to the five senses. Write the name of each item and a brief
description on a separate index card. Then
show your students each of the items and discuss the various sensory characteristics
of each one. Randomly place the items
around your classroom. Then read aloud
the description of each item from the index card. Have pairs of children try to locate the item
that is being described. Below are some
suggested items and descriptions for the scavenger hunt. Happy hunting!
a. Something
that taste sour (lemon)
b. Something
that is rough to touch (sandpaper or burlap)
c. Something
that is pleasant to smell (flower or perfume)
d. Something
that tastes sweet (honey)
e. Something
that make a loud sound (horn)
f. Something
that makes a ticking sound (a clock or timer)
g. Something
that feels soft (cotton)
h. Something
that looks colorful (a picture of a rainbow)
i. Something
that smells spicy (cloves or cinnamon)
j. Something to
look through or read (a book)
9. Seasonal Senses: make a
pocket chart for each season using the senses. Title it In The (Fall, Winter,
Spring, Summer) and use the following sentence frames:
I can
see_____.
I can
hear_____.
I can
smell_____.
I can
taste_____.
I can
touch_____.
I usually have the children help me
generate a list of things (5 to7 items) for each sense and then write those
words on sentence strips and put a picture next to them. I use these to make the chart interactive by
filling in the blanks of the pocket chart sentences with them.
Five
Senses Songs and Rhymes:
Five Little Senses
Five little senses are what I need,
To use when things are near.
I use my eyes to look and see.
I use my ears to hear.
I use my nose to smell things.
I use my hands to touch.
I use my mouth to taste
The things I love to eat so much.
Five little senses standing in a row,
To see, hear, smell, touch and taste
The things I need to know.
5 Senses Poem
We use five senses every day
To help us learn and play.
See, hear, smell, touch, taste.
We do these every day.
Sing a Song of Senses
(sung to the tune of "The Farmer in the Dell")
We use
our tongues to taste.
We use our tongues to taste.
We taste the flavors in our food.
We use our tongues to taste.
We use
our ears to hear.
We use our ears to hear.
We hear noises loud and soft.
We use our ears to hear.
We use
our eyes to see.
We use our eyes to see.
We see colors all around.
We use our eyes to see.
We use
our noses to smell.
We use our noses to smell.
We smell flowers and perfume.
We use our noses to smell.
We use
our hands to touch.
We use our hands to touch.
We touch things both smooth and rough.
We use our hands to touch.
Five Senses
(Tune: Where is Thumbkin)
Five senses, five senses
We have them. We have them.
Seeing, hearing, touching,
Tasting
and smelling.
There
are five. There are five.
Five Senses
(Tune: B-I-N-G-O)
There are
five senses that we all know,
Can you help
us name them?
See, hear,
taste, touch, smell
See, hear,
taste, touch, smell
See, hear,
taste, touch, smell
These are
our five senses!
Discovering
My World
(sung to the tune of “You Are My
Sunshine”)
I have five
senses.
Five helpful
senses,
Teaching me
all things
I want to
know.
I use my eyes,
ears,
Mouth, nose,
and fingers
To discover
the world as I grow!
Senses
Work in Harmony
(sung
to the tune of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”)
My sense are a part of me-
A nose to
smell and eyes to see,
Ears to hear
and hands to touch,
A tongue to
taste good food and such.
My senses
are a part of me,
Working all
in harmony.
Happy
Senses (fingerplay)
(stand and point to the body parts as they are
mentioned)
Eyes,
eyes-they can see.
Nose,
nose-it can smell.
Fingers,
fingers-they cantouch.
Hip, hip, hooray! I’m happy! (dancing and spinning)
Teeth,
teeth-they can chew.
Tongue,
tongue-it can taste.
Finger,
fingers-they can touch.
Hip, hip,
hooray! I’m happy! (dancing and spinning)
Five
Senses (Fingerplay)
I have two
ears to hear with. (holding up two fingers)
I have two
eyes to see with (holding up two fingers)
I have two
hands to touch things. (holding up two fingers)
They’re all
a part of me.
I have a
mouth to taste with. (holding up one finger)
I use it
when I speak,
And a nose I
use to smell things. (holding up one finger)
All my parts
make me unique.
These are my
five senses. (holding up five fingers)
I use them
everyday.
They help me
understand my world.
In a very
special way.
Splendid
Senses
(sung
to the tune of “The Bear Went Over the Mountain”)
My (eyes)
are made for (seeing).
My (eyes)
are made for (seeing).
My (eyes)
are made for (seeing).
So I can
(see) my world.
Continue
with the following: ears…hearing, nose…smelling, mouth…tasting, hands…touching.
Christmas
Senses
(Sung to Frere Jacques)
Looks like
Christmas
Looks like
Christmas
See the
lights, on the trees
Aren’t they
pretty, see how they sparkle
In the night
In the night
Sounds like
Christmas
Sounds like
Christmas
All around,
Everywhere
Hear the children
singing, hear the bells ringing
Through the
air
Through the
air
Smells like
Christmas
Smells like
Christmas
I can smell
the pine trees, I can smell the cookies
Tastes like
Christmas
Tastes like
Christmas
Gingerbread,
Gingerbread
I will taste
the cookies that we bake together
Taste so
good
Taste so
good
Feels like
Christmas
Feels like
Christmas
I can’t
wait, I can’t wait
Santa will
be coming, loaded down with presents
Get to bed
(Shake finger)
Get to bed
(Shake finger)
Additional
Five Senses Songs – Click on each to see them:
Favorite
Five Senses Books:
My Five
Senses by Aliki
My Five
Senses by Margaret Miller
Busy Bunnies
Five Senses by Teddy Slater
Where Are You
Going? by Kimberlee Grave and Rozanne Lanczak Williams
What Can It
Be? Riddles About the Senses by
Jacqueline A. Ball
QEB Let’s
Start Science series by Sally Hewitt
Rookie
Read-About Health series by Sharon Gordon
Look,
Listen, and Learn by Susan Canizares and Pamela Chanko
Time-to-Discover
Scholastic Readers series by Melvin and Gilda Berger
The
You Can’t Smell a
Flower With Your Ear!: A Book About Your 5 Senses by Joanna Cole
You Can’t
Taste a Pickle With Your Ear!: A Book About Your 5 Senses by Harriet Ziefert
Favorite
Five Senses Teacher Resources:
Paso
Partners Five Senses Lessons (extensive lessons and activities) http://www.sedl.org/scimath/pasopartners/senses/
Little
Giraffes 5 Senses Website http://www.littlegiraffes.com/fivesenses.html
Gayle’s
Preschool Rainbow – Preschool Activity Theme: The Five Senses http://www.preschoolrainbow.org/5senses.htm
(Email
any questions, comments, or additions)
Graphics used on
this page from:
Suzy’s Home of Graphics (free
graphics) at http://www.geocities.com/Vienna/Opera/7168/index.html
Microsoft Clip Art
D.J.Inkers (purchased CD called Kiddlywinks) www.djinkers.com
Webpage
Last Updated on August 6, 2008
Disclaimer: Gracemor and the