Planting Food Stickers – Version 1

A few months ago, we made these “sight word sticks” with stickers and craft sticks.  After pasting the fruit and vegetable stickers on the sticks, my daughter was quickly disinterested in the sticks, and I needed to come up with a way to give the sticks more purpose.  I am glad that I didn’t recycle them, since she had a lot of fun with this fruit and vegetable Planting Food Stickers activity.  While reinforcing character recognition, we learned about foods that grow from trees versus the ground.

I grew up in a small town in central New York with a large grassy yard where my mother could be found in the garden.  We always had fresh vegetables (well, minus those long winters), and my mother took pride collecting seeds, nourishing them, and checking to see when they would be ready to cook.

Now I live in drought-ridden California with a black thumb, but our local farmer’s markets has blessed us with a large variety of fruits and vegetables year round.  We also have had fun picking strawberries, blueberries, peaches, nectarines, and persimmons at nearby farms.  I would love to have a garden in our small yard someday so my children and I can share the special task of tending to it, just as I did with my parents.

Since we don’t have a real garden, this activity aims to emphasize the importance of healthy and fresh garden foods through the use of stickers!

Important vocabulary:

1. 请帮忙种蔬菜 (Qǐng bāng máng zhòng shū cài / Please help plant vegetables)
2. 请帮忙种水果 (Qǐng bāng máng zhòng shuǐ guǒ / Please help plant fruit)
3. 泥土 (nítǔ / soil)
4. 树 (shù / tree)

What you need:

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1. Craft sticks
2. Fruit and vegetable stickers
3. Green & brown construction paper
4. Markers & pens

What to do:

1. Write food name on each stick.  Since my daughter is learning Chinese & Korean, we wrote the Chinese translation on one side and Korean on the other side
2. Affix stickers back-to-back to corresponding stick
3. Use green and brown construction paper to create trees and soil
4. Write names of fruit and vegetables on paper.  Also label 树 (shù / tree) and 泥土 (nítǔ / soil)
5. Affix stickers to corresponding word on paper.  Use craft sticks for reference if unsure how to read character.

Check out the next post for another way to use these crafts sticks to teach vegetables!

If you try this activity, let us know!  Leave a comment and don’t forget to tag a photo #ChalkAcademy on Instagram. 

Happy learning, friends!