Last Minute - 5 Step Earth Day Project
5 Step Recycled Eggshell Sprouting
Caring for our earth and understanding a food’s journey from seed to table truly go hand in hand. We believe the best way to help children to appreciate and care for their planet is to harness their inherent curiosity, and engage them with nature right in their own home! This meaningful project, for you and your family, uses things you’re almost guaranteed to already have on hand!
What you need:
Egg shells (as many as you want!)
Dried Lima beans, or any other dried beans on hand (kidney beans works great too)
Water or soda bottle caps, or old egg carton
Soil or shredded cotton balls
Water
Directions:
Talk with your children about what it REALLY means to recycle. I’ve found that children don’t always connect throwing a bottle into the correct bin with just exactly how it helps our planet. An easy way to explain recycling is “we can take something old, and turn it into something new, to help our planet by not wasting.”
You can rinse your eggshells if you’d like, but we left any residue in the egg shells to dry/harden to see if it could act as a “fertilizer.”
Place an egg shell half in each bottle cap to keep it steady, or use an old egg carton as a planter (as pictured). Scoop damp (but not soaked) soil into each egg shell (or use shredded cotton) so that it’s relatively full. Show children how to press down the bean, so that it goes all the way down into the soil. If using cotton, just be sure the cotton is fully covering the bean.
Keep the soil moist, but not soaked, and kept in a well lit, sunny place. Enjoy watching the seed cycle alongside your children, and transplant any sprouted beans into a larger pot of soil, or garden! The best part, the egg is biodegradable!
Want more activities, just like this, right at your fingertips? Click HERE or any image below to get started!
