Lesson plan Kindergarten Health & Consumer Science
Puddles, Drains, and Clean Hands: A Rainy Day Kindergarten Lesson
A 35-minute kindergarten lesson on rainy-day health habits: where playground rainwater goes, why puddle water is not for drinking, and washing hands after outdoor play.
Objectives
- Students will describe where rain that lands on the playground goes.
- Students will explain why puddle water and drain water are not safe to drink.
- Students will draw and dictate a storm drain sign for the class hallway.
Vocabulary
Key words: puddle, drain, litter, dirty, wash
Teacher overview
After a rainy morning, children come in from the blacktop with wet hands and go straight to snack. This lesson pairs two health habits with one piece of water knowledge: rain that falls on the playground picks things up on its way to the storm drain, so puddle water is not drinking water, and hands that have been in it need soap before snack.
The teaching note is to hold the tray demonstration at child eye level and to tilt it slowly. Children need to see the water pick up the soil and carry the wrapper, because the whole lesson rests on that one observation. Marigold School is the name used in the demonstration, and substituting your own school and your own blacktop works better.
Set the tray up before the class arrives so the soil is already spread across one end. If your playground has a visible storm drain, walk the class past it during the outdoor minutes and point out the grate.
Procedure
Opening at the carpet (5 min): Ask who walked through a puddle this week. Take a few stories. Then ask the question that runs through the lesson: "When the rain stops, where does all that puddle water go?" Accept every answer without correcting. Tell the class they will watch it happen on a tray.
Tray demonstration (10 min): Set the shallow tray flat with a spoonful of soil at one end and a wrapper and paper scrap in the middle. Tell the class the tray is the Marigold School blacktop. Pour water slowly over the soil end while holding the tray flat, then lift that end so the water runs to the low corner. Ask what the water looks like now and what it carried with it. Name the low corner: on a real playground, it is the storm drain, and the water goes down the grate and into a pipe that runs to a creek. Ask the health question directly: "Would you drink the water in this corner?" Hold up the tray so everyone can see the answer for themselves.
Litter card sort (10 min): Show the picture cards one at a time. For each, children show thumbs up if it belongs in the trash can and thumbs down if it is fine to leave on the ground. One child says why for each card. The cards that cause argument, such as an apple core and a pile of leaves, are the useful ones. Let two children give both sides, then agree that what matters is whether the rain can carry it into the drain. This is the formative check: if more than a few children give the apple core a thumbs down without a reason, stop and talk it through before moving on.
Handwashing and sign making (7 min): Send the class to wash hands the way they would after outdoor play, then give each child a half sheet. Each child draws a storm drain sign for the hallway and dictates or writes one sentence about it. Scribe for children who dictate.
Closing (3 min): Read four signs aloud, then repeat both class sentences together: Rain carries what we leave on the ground, and puddle water is not drinking water.
Student Handout
Playground litter cards. Draw or print simple pictures on cards. Whiteboard sketches work as well as clip art.
- A candy wrapper on the blacktop.
- A paper napkin blown against the fence.
- An apple core near the field.
- A pile of wet leaves by the wall.
- A plastic straw in a puddle.
- A juice pouch beside the bench.
- A broken crayon on the path.
- A soda can under the slide.
- A grass clipping pile on the sidewalk.
- A paper cup in the drain grate.
Read aloud before the sign making: Make a sign for our hall. The sign tells kids what to keep out of the drain. Draw one thing that must go in the trash can. Then tell me the words for your sign.
From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.
Differentiation
Support
Sit the child beside the tray for the pour so they can see it from the side, and let them tilt the tray themselves for a second run. Use six cards instead of ten and leave out the ones that invite argument. For the sign, offer a pre-drawn grate outline that the child colors and captions by dictation.
Extension
Give a pair of confident children the apple core card and the leaf card together and ask them to decide, as a pair, whether those two belong with the wrapper, then explain their thinking to the class in one or two sentences. For the sign, ask them to write the caption independently and to add a second line telling readers what to do instead.
ELL supports
Pre-teach puddle, drain, litter, and wash with the objects and the tray in front of the child before the whole-group demonstration. The thumbs sort needs no speech, so every child can take part from the first card. Accept dictated sign captions in the home language and add one English word together while scribing.
Extensions
Walk the class outdoors on the next dry day with a bucket and gloves and collect what the rain would have carried, leaving anything sharp or broken for an adult to pick up, then wash hands, count the pieces together, and post the number beside the signs. If your town runs a storm drain marking program, ask whether a kindergarten class may watch a marker being installed, which most crews are glad to arrange.