1st grade · Science · Unit 5 of 7
How Plants Grow & Change
Life cycles, seeds, and making food from sunlight
What your child practices
From seed to flower and back to seed, how seeds travel, how plants react to light and seasons, and how they use sunlight, water and carbon dioxide to make food and release oxygen.
Arizona Academic Standards learning standard: 1.L1U1.6 · the life cycles of plants
How we explain it
Children can open this short lesson before they practice.
- A seed sprouts, grows, flowers and makes new seeds.
- Bright flowers bring bees. Animals carry seeds.
- Leaves use sunlight to make food and give off oxygen.
Example: Why do flowers have bright colors? Bees see the colors. Bees carry pollen. Answer: to bring bees
How Plants Grow & Change in Arizona
In the Arizona Academic Standards, this is unit 5 of 7 in 1st grade Science, after Plant Parts at Work and before Basic Needs & Life Cycles.
Gradelings describes a child's practice on this unit as Beginning, Approaching, Meeting or Exceeding (Four practice steps). That reflects practice, not a report-card mark: the teacher decides the mark.
Source: Arizona Department of Education
Sample questions
A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.
Question 1
When a seed starts to grow into a new plant, it is…
🌱- pollinating
- hibernating
- germinating
- migrating
germinating
Hint: Germination is when a seed sprouts.
Question 2
Put the life cycle of a bean plant in order. Tap the first stage first.
- 🌿seedling with leaves
- 🌱seed sprouts
- 🌰seed
- 🫘pods with new seeds
- 🌼plant with flowers
seed → seed sprouts → seedling with leaves → plant with flowers → pods with new seeds
Hint: A seed sprouts into a seedling, grows leaves, flowers, and makes new seeds.
Question 3
Why do flowers have bright colors and sweet smells?
🦋- to scare the rain away
- to hide from the Sun
- to cool the plant
- to attract pollinators like bees
to attract pollinators like bees
Hint: Bees and butterflies visit flowers for nectar. They carry pollen as they go.
Question 4
Chlorophyll gives leaves their green color. What else does it do?
🍃- stops the leaf from falling
- helps the leaf capture sunlight
- makes the leaf smell sweet
- pulls water up from the roots
helps the leaf capture sunlight
Hint: Chlorophyll catches sunlight so the plant can make food.
Question 5
How does the seed travel? Tap an item, then tap its basket.
Sort into: 🌬️ carried by the wind · 🐿️ carried by animals
- 🐿️acorn buried by a squirrel
- 🍁maple key (a seed with a wing)
- 🌿milkweed fluff
- 🐻raspberry eaten by a bear
- 🐕burdock burr stuck in fur
- 🌼dandelion fluff
🌬️ carried by the wind: maple key (a seed with a wing), milkweed fluff, dandelion fluff · 🐿️ carried by animals: acorn buried by a squirrel, raspberry eaten by a bear, burdock burr stuck in fur
Hint: Light fluffy or winged seeds ride the wind. Sticky burrs and tasty fruits travel with animals.
Question 6
A cactus has a thick stem. How does that help it survive?
🌵- it holds the seeds
- it keeps the cactus cold
- it stores water for dry times
- it catches rain from the clouds
it stores water for dry times
Hint: Deserts get little rain. A cactus saves water in its stem.