The Five Senses: Sense of Smell

As the children arrived today, Mr. Broom was waiting to greet them- with his nose!  We had to wait until after lunch to learn all about his new sense, but we did lots of activities throughout the day related to our sense of smell. 

During free choice time, I put out scented play dough that I made over the weekend.  It worked beautifully! I had never made the Bisquick play dough before in the microwave, but it is so easy and a great texture. As we were shopping for the Bisquick, my husband was so happy that he found the "Healthy Heart Bisquick," and I told him it really didn't matter. Poor thing- he actually thought we were shopping for food to EAT.  :)

Here is the recipe:

Bisquick Play Dough

2 cups Bisquick
1 cup salt
2 cups water
1 Tbsp cream of tartar
1 Tbsp oil
 
Mix all ingredients in a microwave safe bowl.  Microwave for 3 minutes.  Scrape and stir the bowl. Microwave for another 3 minutes. Mine was perfect to knead then. If not, microwave for another minute.

Then, I separated this into 3 parts and put it into Ziplock bags.  I added the food coloring and mixed it in the bags so the play dough was beautiful colors - and my hands were still human looking.  I also added the extracts at this time. 

I made these colors and flavors:

brown- real cinnamon; yellow- banana; orange- orange; green- mint; pink- coconut (because that was the other extract I had... and I didn't have something fun like raspberry or strawberry); white- vanilla

I used quite a bit of extract so it smelled great. (So did my kitchen!) I think the kids were most fascinated with the real cinnamon. 

For our quiet walks in the hall, I used another smell favorite.   Before we leave the classroom, I put a magic dot on each child's hand to smell- and to remind them to be quiet and walk nicely in the hall.  I bought these in the beginning of the year and they have been worth every single penny.  The kids love them!

I keep them in our happy little bucket by the door and go through big process of picking the perfect scent for the day or particular trip down the hall.  For some reason, it is magical.  :)

 

 

 

During Literacy Centers, we worked on Secret Scented Sight Words.  (This sounded much better than Secret Smelly Sight Words.)  First we folded papers to make 8 boxes.  We did our hotdog fold, and two hamburger folds.  I wrote the first secret word in each child's box with a white crayon.  Next, the child had to color over the box with a scented marker to discover the word.  Then, each of the partners wrote a word in the next box with the white crayon and switched papers to color over the box to discover what sight word their partner wrote for them. 

This activity was at my table with me, so if the children were having a tricky time, I wrote the words for them with the white crayon. We had a ball with this activity.  Any time those scented markers come out, fun times will follow!

Finally, after lunch, we gathered on the rug and talked about Mr. Broom's new addition!  We read Follow Your Nose by Paul Showers and our Sense of Smell book by Maria Ruis- both quick reads that introduce the sense of smell.  I pulled up my Five Senses Prezi, because it has a good diagram of how the sense of smell works. It also shows a poster of how the nose hairs, cilia, keep dirt out of your nostrils. We talked about how and why our sense of smell affects our sense of taste.  We watched some of the youtube videos that really explained how your nose helps you smell. 

Our next activity was to Guess the Smell!  I had the children sit in a circle and reminded them of our usual game rules when I do not want anyone shouting out.  They know to nod their head "yes" if they think they know, but nobody says a word until I count to three after we have all had a chance to smell, and we say the answer together.  They do an awesome job with this.  One time a child "goofs" and shouts it out and someone acts disappointed, nobody else wants to shout it out. 

This year I discovered the BEST way to have children guess smells. 

These are PERFECT for smell bottles!  I put a cotton ball with mint and vanilla extracts, baby powder, cinnamon, peanut butter (that you can see on the inside of  that back yellow bottle!), and garlic powder inside these.  As I went around the circle, I just squeezed the bottle and a puff of smell came out! So easy! I got them at the Dollar Store- 2 for a dollar! 
The kids loved them later, too.

(OK not so much the garlic!:)

Last, the children each got their Five Senses book and wrote about their favorite things to smell. Each day they add a sense.  I have them draw and label at least five favorite things.

We had great conversations about smells, and it really had me thinking. As the children were talking about what different smells reminded them of, I was thinking how much smells affect me.  I think of my grandparents' house every time I go into a store baking rotisserie chickens because it smells like their house did when she would have us over, or every time I smell a barbeque outside because we would have cookouts at their house especially after parades.  Every time I am in a certain aisle of Lowes, I think of when my dad had a hardware store because it smells just like that- or when we built our house that we moved into when I was in first grade.  Every time I go into Sams Club, I remember the very first time my mom and I went in when it first opened with my kids- probably about 17 years ago! Hawaiian Tropic suntan lotion can put me in a good mood any time I smell it.  I thought it was just me, until my husband told me that whenever he smells Dawn dish detergent, he thinks of the first time we went to Florida, because we must have used it then.  It is fun to think about. Do you have any special smell memories? 

As we watched the videos about the nose on the rug, sitting close together, one little boy smelled the hair of the girl next  to him and said, "MMMM. You smell just like my Nana."   <3

Tomorrow, Mr. Broom will be able to see!
Thank you for visiting! 
Happy Teaching,
Carolyn