Subscribe

Kindergarten · Science · Unit 3 of 11

Materials

Soft, hard, rough and smooth

What your child practices

Describing everyday materials (soft or hard, rough or smooth, bendy or stiff), what sinks or floats, and naming what things are made of, like wood, metal, glass and cloth.

Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) teks student expectation: K.6 · describing and sorting objects by their physical properties

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. Touch it. Is it soft or hard? Rough or smooth?
  2. Things are made of wood, metal, glass or cloth.
  3. Light things like leaves often float on water.

Example: Is a pillow soft or hard? Squeeze it in your mind. It squishes. Squishy things are soft. Answer: soft

Materials in Texas

In the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS), this is unit 3 of 11 in Kindergarten Science, after Animal Features and before Weather & Seasons.

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: Texas Education Agency (TEA)

Sample questions

A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.

  1. Question 1

    Which one is made of cloth?

    • 🔑key
    • 👕T-shirt
    • 🪨rock

  2. Question 2

    Which one is made of metal?

    • 🔑key
    • 👕T-shirt
    • 📕book

  3. Question 3

    Soft or hard? Tap a picture, then its basket.

    Sort into: 🧸 soft · 🪨 hard

    • 🧣scarf
    • 🔨hammer
    • 🪙coin
    • 🧱brick
    • 🧽sponge
    • 🧶yarn

  4. Question 4

    Which one feels smooth?

    • 🥚egg
    • 🍍pineapple
    • 🪵tree bark

  5. Question 5

    Which one is soft?

    • 🧸teddy bear
    • 🧱brick
    • 🪨rock

  6. Question 6

    Which one is hard?

    • 🧦sock
    • 🪨rock
    • 🪶feather

More Kindergarten