Primary Booklet: Reproduction and Life Cycles - Part 1

One of a series of booklets written to support plant science in the Primary Curriculum. This topic extends pupils' understanding of the parts of a flower and their functions, with a range of fun activities to reinforce pupil learning.

This is the second theme in the series, published in two separate booklets: Part 1 (Parts of a flower) and Part 2 (Pollination, fertilisation, fruits and seed dispersal). In Part 1, the topic starts by introducing children to the basic parts of a flower and their functions, helping to build on their understanding of the parts of a plant, covered in booklet 1 of the series. It provides a range of activities that include dissection of a flower to see its parts – the sepals, petals, stamens and stigma, style and ovary – and how they are arranged, ways of making simple models of a plant and card games that are fun but at the same time reinforce children’s learning and help them to be ready to move on to the next stage.

The 6 'Plants for Primary Pupils' booklets were written in conjunction with the Field Studies Council, and copies were sent out to all UK state primary schools. For extra print copies, please contact the FSC. The booklets can also be downloaded in PDF form from the links on the right. Worksheets are also available online in Word format for editing in your own classroom.

Contents

Parts A to E are available as separate pdf files. Items in Part F, were originally available on CD, are now available as pdf and Word files. Download them from the links on the right.

Part A

• Safety
• Copyright information and acknowledgements
• Contents
• Looking at plant life cycles – a seasonal teaching planner
• Introduction
• Reproduction and life cycles
• Reference to literacy, numeracy, assessment and investigative skills
• Using the CD (part 1)

Part B

• Introducing the parts of a flower
• Disecting a flower
• Finding out more about flower parts
• Finding out about the number of flower parts
• Whole-parts relationship – using a graphic organiser

Part C

• Create a flower
• Building a flowering plant game
• Colouring a flowering plant game

Part D

• Games with cards
• Matching pairs
• Loop cards – flower part dominoes, with pictures
• Loop cards – flower part dominoes, with definitions
• Traditional game of bingo
• Flower splat
• Plant taboo

Part E

• Background information for teachers
• Reproduction and life cycles – the flower, fruits and seeds
• Reproduction in flowering plants
• The structure of the flower
• The numbers of flower parts
• Flowers to study – some suggestions
• Examples of dissected flowers
• Definitions

Part F (Originally available on CD - now available as PDFs and Word docs)

• Introducing this CD
• Acknowledgements
• Safety
• Contents
• Using this CD

• Templates
• Flower parts for ‘Building a flowering plant game’
• Card sets 1, 2 and 3
• Grids for bingo and splat
• Cards for taboo

• Additional background information for teachers
• Asexual reproduction – some notes and drawings
• Examples of dissected flowers
• Wallflower, sugar snap pea

• Templates - for grids (bingo and splat) and cards for taboo are also available as Word rtf documents

Acknowledgements

Science and Plants for Schools and the Field Studies Council are grateful for permission to include the following copyright photographs and artwork. Photographs: All photographs are by John Bebbington FRPS. Artwork: All artwork, including cartoons and cover artwork by Anne Bebbington, with the exception of Figure 8. Illustrations used in Figure 8 are reproduced by courtesy of The Cavendish School, London.

Members of the Writing Group: Anne Bebbington (FSC and SAPS), Colin Bielby (Manchester Metropolitan University), Janette Kean (Westfield Primary School, West Lothian), Ruth Thomas (Cavendish School) and Erica Clark (editor, SAPS). We are grateful to Maggie Bolt and John Hewitson for their skill and effort, and to the following who reviewed the text and activities during the development of this booklet: Rosemary Boaz, Mary Haworth, Judy Vincent, Paul Warwick and.