Introduction and Summary
Eric Carle’s , The Tiny Seed, is a fabulous book about the life cycle of a tiny little seed as it finds it’s way through the world high in the air, far away, across the ocean, past hungry birds, endures the winter and spring and ends up growing into a beautiful giant flower that the whole community admires. Eric Carle’s way with words and amazing collage illustrations turn the life cycle of a seed into a very exciting story and at the end of the giant flower’s life we see the process start all over again.
Curriculum Connections
This book is a great resource to use when instructing elementary school students on life science. The book could be used to build background knowledge or as a refresher on what students may have already learned. It’s a useful resource when instructing on the basic needs and life processes of plants. This book provides many ideas to get creative with your class when teaching the plant life cycle. (K.7a, 1.4a, 2.4b)
Additional Resources
Eric Carle collage instruction sheet. This site provides instructions on how to create a collage in the style of Eric Carle. The students could work in groups as they each create a different scene from the book that depicts the life cycle of a plant. The project could be used as a class display and serve as a reference for later instruction.
How a seed grows into a plant. This is a great interactive site that kids could use independently at a technology center in the classroom while learning about the life cycle of a plant
Here’s a good site for teacher ideas of how to incorporate The Tiny Seed into a lesson. It comes from a Project Learning Tree Workshop in Florida.
This is a great site provided by Agriculture in the Classroom. It provides a worksheet directly related to Eric Carle’s book The Tiny Seed, a hands on activity and a list of words to songs about plants and how things grow.
General Information
Book: The Tiny Seed
Author: Eric Carle
Illustrator: Eric Carle
Publisher: Aladdin Paperbacks
Publication Date: 1987
Pages: 36
Grade Range: K-4
ISBN: 0689842449