Learning about the sense - Taste

As you know we have been learning about the senses. The next sense we have been exploring is the sense of taste. I think this was the children's favourite as they have been asking to do these activities everyday since! First, we read the next book in our senses series; 'Taste that'! 

Then, we did some practical activities. I am a big fan of practical learning experiences, especially for young children. It really engages their attention which makes it more likely they will enjoy, understand and remember what they learn. Here's what we did.






We made some 3D mouths with tongues that pop out! This was very easy to make, You just need a piece of white paper (or other colour of your choice) and a red piece of paper for the tongue. More details about this craft can be found here.



D enjoyed making this.

We divided the tongue into different sections and wrote what tastes you can sense in each area of the tongue.



Here is what the models look like open and closed.



Next, we did the blind taste test. I put samples of food on small dishes for the children to taste. Their job was to describe what they were tasting. There was sugar for the sweet taste, cocoa powder for the bitter taste, salt for the salty taste and lemon for the sour taste. 



Here you can see the children with their eyes open exploring the different tastes again but they tried it first with their eyes closed. Surprising both the children liked the lemon taste. They also liked sugar, of course, but disliked cocoa powder and salt.



I managed to get  photo of R tasting the salt. He definitely didn't like that taste. What a picture!



Next , we did another taste test, this time tasting different condiments on rice crackers. This one wasn't a blind taste test and the children enjoyed spreading the condiments themselves. We tried peanut butter, blueberry and raspberry jam, marmalade, a black syrup made from pears, apples and dates, blueberry curd and spicy tomato chutney.

The children were very reluctant to try the tomato chutney but as it was a taste test I managed to persuade them! D was pleasantly surprised to find she actually liked it and kept going back for more. She said it was one of her favourite condiments! 



They enjoyed testing out the condiments for quite a while. I was surprised at how they ate a few things they had never eaten before. I would definitely recommend doing a taste test game for fussy eaters as perhaps it will get them to try more food. They have been asking to do another taste test for the last few days now. I suspect they liked all the choices and independence of choosing what they wanted to try and spreading it themselves.

Check out these posts to find out how we learnt about the sense of touch, sight, hearing and smell.

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Educational, Homeschool, Science