Smelly Fun!

This week I have been teaching the five senses in Science. There are so many different activities to use but several of them cost a lot of money and take a while to set up. Not only that, but they aren't reusable from year to year. I have come up with an easy, cheap activity for teaching the sense of smell. I take 5 paper plates (or one for each group or partner) and I draw lines to cut it into four sections. Then I label the sections like this:

Then I use a smelly marker to color different colors (smells) into each section of the plate.

Then I use a black magic marker or dry erase marker to draw on top of each smell. Sometimes I go back over each black section with the smelly marker to make sure the smell is strong.

Every table passes their plate and each person smells each section. I have them draw a picture or write the word to describe the smell in each section. Then we do the GRAND REVEAL! I let them all smell the first section again and have them tell me what they think the smell is. We reveal the smell on the board and do the same for the other three smells.

The students love smelling the "mystery smells" and are always excited during the grand reveal! The best part about this activity is that when we are done, I simply put the plates back into my Five Senses file and save them for next year. When the next year comes around, I simply use a smelly marker to go back over each section (make sure you have the reveal plate so you know which section is which) and the activity is ready in a flash!

 I use it every year because it is a cheap and fun way to teach the sense of smell. Let me know what you think! I hope the start of your year is going well (:

-OneCrazyS