Teaching the Plant Life Cycle with Lima Beans

Children learn best when they are able to interact with the learning materials. The best way for them to learn about the life cycle of a plant is to grow their own, from seed to plant. Lima beans work quite well for this.

Read a book about the bean plant life cycle.

Start with a simple book that details the life cycle of the bean plant. Ideally, the book should have real photographs. When reading aloud, adapt the text and conversation to fit the needs of the students. These are a couple of good titles:

**Fowler, Allan. From Seed to Plant (Rookie Read-About Science) {Children's Press, 2001, ISBN 978-0516273

**Schwartz, David M. Bean (Life Cycles) {Creative Teaching Press, 1999, ISBN 978-1574715804)

**Tagliaferro, Linda. The Life Cycle of a Bean. (Capstone Press, 2007, ISBN 978-0736867108)

Invite the children to recreate their own bean life cycle, using lima beans.

Plant lima beans in a plastic bag.

The initial planting activity requires the following materials:

*Bag of lima beans (a bag from the local grocery store will suffice, and is cheaper)
*Paper towel
*Sandwich-sized Ziploc bags
*Water
*Sunny window

Let the children do as much of the work as possible.

1. Write the child's name on a Ziploc bag, using a permanent marker.

2. Have the child wet a piece of folded paper towel. The towel needs to be wet, though not dripping. Sopping wet paper towels will cause the bean seeds to get moldy, but a damp towel will dry out too fast.

3. Place the paper towel in the bottom of the bag.

4. Choose at least two lima beans to place between the paper towel and the bag. The seed needs to be exposed to light, so it should not be covered by the paper towel. Use more than one seed, just in case one is a dud. Up to four can fit in this size bag.

5. Zip the bag shut, then hang it in a sunny window. The damp paper towel plus the sunshine will turn the Ziploc bag into a sort of mini-greenhouse.

Make a few extra bags to hang in different areas around the room. Put one in a closed closet. Put another one across the room from the windows. Hide one under a desk, or on the wall below the windows. Choose different amounts of light for comparison. Set one up in the window without a wet paper towel.

Observe the growth of the bean plant.

Every day, check the lima bean bags for any signs of growth. The first day after planting, the seed should be swelling from absorbing water. Within another day or two, the first roots should appear. Next, look for the first shoots of leaves to appear from the top.

Compare the growth of the different bean plants throughout the room. Record observations in a notebook, using drawings and/or written descriptions.

Plant the lima beans in dirt.

When the bean plants have stems and leaves, they are ready to plant in dirt. You will need potting soil, plus some type of small cup or pot in which to plant the seeds. Again, allow the children to do most of the work.

1. Write the child's name on the outside of the pot, or on a piece of masking tape affixed to the outside of the pot.

2. Fill the pot halfway with potting soil.

3. Gently remove the plant from the paper towel. If some paper towel is still attached to the roots, it is okay. It will break down.

4. Press the roots into the soil. Add more soil if necessary to hold the plant in place.

5. Water the pot.

6. Keep the pots in the window until they take them home.

Also try this experiment with other types of bean seeds.