My favorite season is spring. It's that perfect time of the year when the land turns green and so many flowers blossom in full color. Have you seen Colorado's columbines in bloom? They're gorgeous! Just don't be too eager to pick them because you can be charged with a misdemeanor for picking the state flower on public land.
Here are five other flower-themed things to teach your kids.
1. A silly joke.
You and y'orchids might think this flower joke is funny:
How do you know flowers are friendly? They always have new buds.
2. A new vocabulary word.
If you take a close look at flowers, you'll notice they are made up of more than just petals, seeds, and leaves. Their parts are actually quite intricate. You can learn about the details of each part of a flower from the American Museum of Natural History, but let's take a closer look at a flower's stem system and a silly-sounding word: peduncle.
What is a peduncle? A peduncle is the main stem that supports the inflorescence (which is a fancy name for the grouping of fruits or flowers) of a plant. The smaller stems that support individual fruits or flowers are called pedicels. Next time you're out smelling the flowers, see if you can identify the peduncles and pedicels.
3. A word puzzle.
To solve a rebus, consider not just the words, but the placement, size, color, and quantity of everything within the box (and sometimes just outside the box!) when trying to decipher the puzzle.
Do you have a knack for making things grow? If you do, then you have a "green thumb."
4. A fun fact.
Flowers come in all sorts of shapes and sizes and smells. You've probably enjoyed the fresh scents of roses, lilies, or lavender, but have you ever smelled a corpse flower? You probably won't want to!
The corpse flower is the smelliest plant on Earth. As its name suggests, corpse flowers smell like rotting flesh when in bloom. Despite their unfavorable smell, corpse flowers don't bloom very often (only once every 7-9 years), so seeing these unique flowers bloom in person is quite an extraordinary experience. Want to avoid the smell? Watch a time-lapse of the corpse flower in bloom from the comfort of home.
5. Teach a personal discovery.
Did you know that every flower has a meaning? From love to luck, hope to devotion, flowers are nature's special messengers across the globe and throughout history.
What is your birth month flower? Visit the Farmers Almanac to discover which flower represents your birth month and what that means for you.
"All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today." - Indian Proverb
