Kindergarten through Grade 2
Sunlight and Water for Growth
A fair test with one thing changed and everything else kept the same.
Set up two bags that are identical in every way, then change one thing. Same water, same amount, same room, but one gets light and one does not. That is what makes it a fair test, and it is the first real experiment most students ever run. Within a week the lit bag is deeper green and the dark one has faded.
How the lab meets it
What students do that satisfies the standard
NGSS 2-LS2-1
Standard: Plan and conduct an investigation to determine whether plants need sunlight and water to grow.
What the kit does: The kit puts two different photosynthesisers on the same windowsill. Sprouting seeds build root, stem and leaf out of nothing but light, water and the air sealed in with them. Algae does the same chemistry with no roots and no leaves at all, and shows its answer as colour rather than height. Students shield one bag, keep everything else identical, and record what happens to each over seven days. That record is the investigation the standard asks for.
Texas 1.12.A
Standard: Classify living and nonliving things based on whether they have basic needs and produce young.
What the kit does: Light and water are two of those basic needs, and the bags let a first grader test them rather than be told. The seeds swell, split and push out a shoot. The algae deepens in colour and clouds the water. Take the light away and both of them stall, which is the difference between living and nonliving made visible. Texas teaches this a year before NGSS asks for the formal investigation.
Florida SC.2.L.17.2
Standard: Recognise and explain that living things need a habitat that supplies what they require to survive.
What the kit does: The sealed bag is the habitat, and it is small enough for a student to hold in one hand. Everything the seeds and the algae need is inside it, nothing is added across the week, and it still works. Shielding one bag takes light out of that habitat and leaves the water and air untouched, so students can point at the one thing that changed and the result that followed.
Free downloads
Our Lesson Plans
Each lesson is one Word file. Teacher pages and answer keys first, then the student pages behind the orange PRINT FROM HERE divider.
Do Plants Need Light? Grades K to 5
What it covers: Whether a plant still grows once you take the light away, tested side by side in two sealed bags.
How it is built: One Word file. Teacher notes and answer keys up front, then the student pages behind the orange PRINT FROM HERE divider.
What Green Water Does to Light. Grades K to 2
What it covers: What happens to light on its way through green water, and what that changes for whatever is living down there.
How it is built: One Word file. Teacher notes and answer keys up front, then the student pages behind the orange PRINT FROM HERE divider.
Administrator Guide
One guide for the whole elementary program rather than one per lesson. This is the copy to hand a principal or a curriculum director.