BACKGROUND:

Students observe plants each day, whether they are in a natural setting or in a pot. This exercise will helps children to identify and classify each plant that they see at school. The majority of plants that most children see are the flowering plants or angiosperms. The majority of angiosperms are dicots, The dicots have flower parts in multiples of four or five while monocots have flower parts in multiples of three. The dicots have leaves with a network of veins while monocots have leaves with parallel veins. The xylem and phloem in a dicot are arranged in a ring while they are randomly arranged in a monocot. The monocot seed has one seed leaf while the dicot has two seed leaves. For example a peanut is a dicot while rice and corn are monocots. The roots of dicots show secondary growth which the roots of the monocots do not.

PROCEDURE:

1. Ask students to predict whether there are more species of dicots or monocots at school. Write the responses on the board.
     
2. Have students go out into the school yard in the area designated by you and collect one specimen of each plant species you find. (If you don't want to destroy the plants you may want the students to make plant rubbings or drawings.)
     
3. Bring the specimens to the class, arrange and tape the specimens artistically on a piece of paper, labeling whether the specimen is a monocot or dicot. Go over the following information and diagrams.

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