Materials
3 empty baby food jars
3 metal pie plates
3 spoons
1 cup of bird seed
1 cup of sand
1 cup of walnuts in a shell
Instructions
1. Put one jar and one spoon next to each pie plate. Pour sand into one plate,
walnuts into another, and bird seed into the third plate.
Safety Note: If any of the children have nut allergies, do not use walnuts for
this activity.
2. Ask the children to estimate how many spoonfuls of sand it will take to fill the
jar.
3. Have a child spoon sand into the jar as the rest of the children count.
4. When the first jar is full, ask the children to guess how many spoonfuls of
walnuts it will take to fill the next jar. "Will it take more or less than the sand?"
5. Have a child spoon walnuts into the jar as the rest of the children count.
6. Do the same thing with the third jar and the bird seed.
More to do Outdoor Play: Provide a variety of buckets, scoops, shovels, and so on for
children to experiment with in the sandbox.
