Learning about the 5 senses is an exciting thematic unit for young learners as they are curious about the world around them and use their senses to explore and learn. These Sense of Smell & Taste Activities will make learning so much more fun.
Sense of Smell & Taste Activities
Creative Space
Play dough, stamps, scissors, lacing beads and cards, puzzles and blocks are set out for the children to choose from, and get creative during this 30 minute period.
Sense of Smell & Taste Circle Time
Everyday during Circle Time we do the morning routine, which includes the Calendar and ‘Number, Color, Shape and Letter of the week’. We then read a story, sing a few songs and do a group activity.
On every Monday we change the ‘Classroom Helpers’ Classroom Jobs. Each child has a name card on a popsicle stick, and they get to choose their job of the week.
Sense of Smell & Taste Circle Time Activities
Activity 1: Weekend News
Every Monday morning each child gets a chance to talk about their weekend and what they did. The children then draw a picture in the ‘weekend news’ journal, and the teacher writes down what they have said.
Activity 2: Guess the Smell
Blindfold volunteers and have them smell certain items and guess what they are smelling (i.e. food, socks, a pencil, and eraser, coffee etc.
Activity 3: Simon Says & Yoga Breathing
Say Simon says touch your nose. Everyone touch their noses. Say Simon Says touch your ears. Everyone touch their ears. Continue. When you don’t say ‘Simon Says’ in front of the action, they can’t touch that body part. Anyone that touches it is out.
For the Yoga Breathing Exercise, use this video from YouTube
Activity 4: Fruit Salad
Each player is assigned one of the following senses: hearing, touch, smell, taste, sight. The facilitator will stand in the middle of the circle and call out one of the senses. All players who are assigned that sense will stand up, run around the circle, and sit down in their original spot.
Activity 5: Smell Scavenger Hunt
Take the children for a walk outside and ask them to smell different things. When you get back to class, the children color all the things they could smell.
Sense of Smell & Taste Songs
Eight action songs all about the Senses of Smell & Taste, to get those bodies moving and grooving. Click on the image to head over to the post.
Sense of Smell & Taste Books
Eleven of the best story picture books that are perfect for the Sense of Sight theme. Click on the image below to read what these books are about.
Sense of Smell & Taste Literacy Activities
Activity 1: Llama Llama Yum Yum Yum
Activity 2: Food ABC
Activity 3: Farley Follows His Nose
Activity 4: Yellow Show-and-Tell
Every Thursday is Show-and-Tell. Because the color of the week this week is yellow, I sent a note home to the parents on Monday to remind them to let their child bring in something yellow on Thursday. This is what the kids in my class brought in.
Sense of Smell & Taste Math Activities
There are not too much you could do with the senses of smell and taste and Math, so I thought put together a few centers to practice writing numerals 1 – 6, one-on-one correspondence and to identify shapes.
Center 1: Grab & Count Center
Grab some cubes or any other manipulatives with your left hand, place them on the left-hand picture, count and record. Repeat with the right hand.
Center 2: Roll & Write Center
Roll the dice and write the number in the first block. Continue until all the blocks are full.
Center 3: I Have/ Who Has cards
1. Deal the cards out to each player until there are none left. It does not matter if some players are left with a few extra cards.
2. The player with the first card will say; ‘I have k, who has (j)?’. They will then lay the card in the middle of the table.
3. The player with the letter (j) will say; ‘I have (j), who has (b)?
4. Continue until all cards have been placed on the pile in the middle.
Center 4: Roll & Cover Center
Each child gets a ‘Roll & Cover’ card with a flower on. Children take turns to roll the dice and cover that part of their flower. The first child that has all the parts covered is the winner.
Center 5: Roll & Color Dice Game
Each child gets a ‘Roll & Cover’ card with a flower on. Children take turns to roll the dice and cover that part of their flower. The first child that has all the parts covered is the winner.
Center 6: Numerals Cut-and-Paste
Count forwards and backwards to 10 with the kids while jumping, spinning, clapping, bending your knees etc. Hand out the Numerals cut-and-paste. Children count the number of pictures in each block, find the right numeral, cut it out and paste it on the pictures.
To download all the Sense of Smell & Taste Math centers and activities, click on the image below.
Sense of Smell & Taste Art Activity:
Edible Paint
What you need:
- Paper plates/ hand towels (1 per child)
- Greek Yoghurt
- Food Coloring
- Coffee stirrers/ wooden chopsticks
- Paper cups (6 to mix the food coloring in and 1, cut in half beforehand, per child)
The Activity:
Divide the Greek Yoghurt into 6 paper cups. Put red, blue and yellow food coloring in 3 cups and ask the children to help mix the color in with the coffee stirrers. Then put red and yellow food coloring in one cup and remind the kids that red and yellow makes orange. Do the same with blue & yellow, and blue & red. You now have 6 edible paint colors!
Children sit down at the tables. Place a paper cup, a paper plate and coffee stirrer in front of each child (we used paper towels, but I will definitely use paper plates next time!). Walk around the class and ask the children to choose 1 color. Pour some of the color into the paper cups and let the fun and games begin! I asked the children to draw a face, seeing that we are still busy with the 5 senses, but some of them just enjoyed making dots and scribbles :).
Sense of Smell & Taste Science Activities
Activity 1: Taste test
What you need:
- Something sweet (we used chocolate)
- Something bitter (we used dark chocolate)
- Something sour (like lemons)
- Something salty (we used Lays)
Taste Test Activity:
Cut the lemon into wedges before the activity. During the activity, blindfold volunteers and let them taste each of the above, then guess what they tasted. When this is done, give all the children 1 of the above and ask them to taste them all, then to say whether it was bitter, salty, sweet or sour. My favorite part is always seeing the kids eating the lemon!
Give the cut-and-paste activity sheets to the children. Read the words, emphasizing the beginning and ending sounds. Children complete the activity by cutting, then pasting the pictures under the correct headings.
Activity 2: Painting with Spices
We did not have enough time this week, but I found this awesome activity over at Craftulate.com. Head over to their blog to read more about it.
Phonics
Phonics is taught in order from A – Z and we spend the first semester on learning all the letter sounds. The second semester is spent on Word Families and Sight Words. We learn 2 letter sounds a week through songs, crafts, centers, cut-and-paste activities, tracing & coloring. This week we will learn about the letters Mm & Nn.
Monday: Letter Introduction
Every Monday, the teacher introduces the letters of the week. We watch the Jolly Phonics Letters M & N songs and do the actions, then listen to the Bounce Patrol letters M & N songs. Afterwards, we play the letters Mm & Nn games on Starfall.
The teacher then shows the children the word cards and ask them to name the pictures and to place it under the correct letter on the word wall.
Tuesday & Thursday: Letter Crafts
Tuesdays and Thursdays are reserved for Letter Crafts. The children all love these. For this week we did the ‘M is for Mouse’ and ‘N is for Nest’ Letter Crafts.
Wednesday: Tracing Letters & Beginning Sound Centers
Friday: Beginning Sounds Sorting & Cut-and-Paste
Find the whole weeks printables, centers, activities by clicking on the images below.
