You can do an easy science experiment for a fun pumpkin study by observing a rotting pumpkin. Also, you’ll love my page Fall Season Unit Study {Pumpkins, Leaves, Corn, & More}.
Even though it will take its course through most of the seasons this is still a great experiment.
For example, observe and record the physical and chemical changes over a few weeks and then long term if you wish.
Note: My free printables were free for a limited time for my subscribers.
Also, look at my post How to Turn a Pumpkin Lapbook into a Fun Unit Study.
This pumpkin study with a rotting pumpkin experiment is appropriate for preschool through mid-elementary.
However, the whole family will enjoy observing and seeing how long it takes for each change to occur.
Be sure to download my pumpkin printables to use along with this pumpkin study.
The life cycle worksheet goes especially well with this activity.
5 Pumpkin Study Life Cycle Facts
Let’s walk through the 5 simple steps of a pumpkins life cycle.
- A pumpkin’s life starts by planting a pumpkin seed in the warm ground, if the pumpkin has access to lots of water and sunshine the seeds will become a small plant, or sprout.
- Then the leaves and vines will begin to grow larger. They grow outward.
- Next, the yellow pumpkin flowers will blossom, and then fall off, here is where the tiny pumpkins will start.
- Now, a little green pumpkin will grow.
- That green pumpkin will ripen overtime into an orange pumpkin and ripen and be ready to pick.
Also, add some of these books about pumpkins and resources to your study.
8 Pumpkin Books
Grab some of these fun books about pumpkins, fall and fall harvest.
Rebecca Estelle has hated pumpkins ever since she was a girl when pumpkins were often the only food her family had. When an enormous pumpkin falls off a truck and smashes in her yard, she shovels dirt over the pieces and forgets about them. But those slimy pumpkin smithereens sprout up in autumn, and Rebecca Estelle finds a sea of pumpkins in her garden. A heartwarming classic for more than twenty years, this story shows what happens when one thrifty gardener figures out how to make other people happy with the squash she can't stomach.
Seed, Sprout, Pumpkin, Pie follows Apples for Everyone in the Picture the Seasons series. This beautifully photographed picture book about everybody’s favorite fall treat is sure to please kids both young and old. The glossy, festive images and lively text are sure to get your family in the mood to celebrate the season.Pumpkins! Who can resist the sight of big, round, orange pumpkins ripening in a field?
Every year, giant pumpkin contests take place at fairs across the country—the 2012 record-holder weighed over a ton! The latest craze is to carve the most enormous pumpkins into racing boats. But what’s next? Why not think really big? Award-winning artist Wendell Minor does just that as he imagines larger-than-life pumpkins decorating some of America’s favorite places—as immense as the Capitol dome, Mount Rushmore, the Brooklyn Bridge, even the Grand Canyon! This celebration of famous landmarks and landscapes plays with concepts of size and scale and is full of fun facts.
How many seeds are in a pumpkin?" Mr. Tiffin asks his class as they gather around the big, medium, and small pumpkins on his desk. Robert, the biggest kid, guesses that the largest one has a million seeds; Elinor, sounding like she knows what she's talking about, guesses the medium one has 500 seeds; and Anna, who likes even numbers better than odd ones, guesses that the little one has 22. Charlie, the smallest boy in the class, doesn't have a guess.
This is a clear and appealing environmental science book for early elementary age kids, both at home and in the classroom. Plus it includes a find out more section with activities such as an experiment to show how plants use roots to drink water from the ground and a recipe for roasted pumpkin seeds.
"Mr. Tresselt writes quiet, factual prose about katydids, reapers and threshing, falling leaves, apple-gathering, and the first frost."-
Mr. Hermit Miser doesn’t like his neighbors, and they don’t like him. But when a pumpkin vine sprouts in Mr. Hermit Miser’s yard and makes its way into the neighbors’ yards, but he wants all those pumpkins for pies … well, what is he to do?
With adventures in pumpkin-snatching, failed attempts at baking pies, and pumpkin goo everywhere, this tale about being neighborly in a not-so-perfect way will be an endearing autumn story for all the readers in your circle.
Pumpkin Vocabulary
While observing your rotting pumpkin here are a few vocabulary words to introduce.
Older children can look them up with a physical dictionary and define the words, put them in alphabetical order, or even use them as their spelling words for the week.
- Pumpkin- A coarse vine generally cultivated for its large pulpy round orange fruit with a firm orange skin and many seeds.
- Organism- a living thing made up of one or more cells and able to carry on the activities of life using energy, growing, and reproducing.
- Life cycle- the series of changes in the life of an organism.
- Decompose– to break down or be broken down into simpler parts, especially by the action of living things.
- Fungus-any of a group of spore-producing organisms that feed on organic matter, including molds, yeast, mushrooms, and toadstools.
- Harvest- to gather in a crop, to gather or collect for use.
- Germinate- to begin to grow.
Next, add some pumpkin stem activities.
Hands-on Pumpkin Activities and Pumpkin STEM
- 10 Pumpkin Fall Crafts and Two Yummy Pumpkin Seed Recipes
- Grow these Pumpkin Shaped Crystals for a fun experiment in simple chemistry.
- Pumpkin Anatomy | Kids Exploring the Parts of a Pumpkin And Printables
- This Pumpkin Chemistry-Testing for vitamin C with iodine experiment is great for multiple ages.
- How to Make Pumpkin Spice Body Scrub & 7 Fall DIY Crafts For Teens
- Work in some math with measuring, weighing, and counting seeds using Fun With Pumpkins
- Kids Fun Glue and Watercolor Fall Pumpkin Unit Study
- This challenge includes 4 awesome activities – Exploding Pumpkin STEAM: 4 Fall Pumpkin Activities and will really engage the kids.
- Kids Fun Pumpkin Catapult STEM Challenge for Medieval Unit Study
- Create a raft for your pumpkin that will float in the Easy Science Experiments for Fall.
- Fall Y’all:Pumpkin Pie in a Bag (Easy Homeschool Co-op Idea)
- Consider creating a science journal just to document the rotting pumpkin from start to finish with images and notes.
Finally, look at this rotting pumpkin experiment.
Rotting Pumpkin Experiment
You can start your rotting pumpkin experiment anytime in the fall but do expect it to take 6-8 months for the full decomposing and resprout.
So, this is a long-term experiment.
You will need:
- Small pumpkin
- Glass jar with sealing lid
- Soil
- Spray bottle of water
Place 2 inches of soil in the bottom of your jar.
Spray the inside of the jar and soil well with bottle of water.
Cut the top of the pumpkin off.
Then cut a few holes in your pumpkin.
Before placing your pumpkin in a jar, it’s a great time to let your little one explore with pinchers and a magnifying glass.
Pumpkin Science Rotting Pumpkin Experiment
Look at the leaves and the fibrous strings in the skin.
Talk about the different parts of a pumpkin, and what each one does.
Remove some seeds at this time and wrap them in a wet paper towel.
Place them in a plastic baggie and tape them to a sunny window for a few days until they sprout.
To encourage quicker germination, you can take fingernail clippers and clip just the edge of the shell. You don’t want to damage the tender seed inside.
When they are done exploring the pumpkin, place it on top of the soil.
Place the sealing lid back on the jar, if yours does not have the silicone sealing ring you can use tape to seal the edges.
Place the jar in a warm sunny window.
Check back on your pumpkin every day and each time you do observe and talk about the physical changes you see.
Here is our pumpkin after 24 hours.
3 days
10 days.
14 days.
A few times early on you might want to remove the lid and open the pumpkin to observe what’s happening inside.
But eventually you will not want to take the lid off until you have it outside, it can get close.
Besides, the moisture and warm air trapped in the jar will help it decompose faster.
We will keep it going until it’s ready to replant next year.
Once your pumpkin has completely broken down, take your jar, parentheses outside, parentheses and remove the land spritz the soil very well with water.
Within a few days, you should start to be able to see pumpkin sprouts. If you have too many in your jar, you can remove some and plant them in other containers.
Note: My free printables were free for a limited time for my subscribers.
Grab the pumpkin lapbook and notebooking pages below
How to Get the Pumpkin Lapbook and Notebooking Pages
Finally, I have a fun pumpkin lapbook to use with multiple ages. I geared it toward grades 2 to 4 but again grades are selective as we know.
Look at the printables included in the download.
- More Pumpkin Facts & Fun pocket to glue on back of file folder
- One front outside cover in color. Mix and match the pieces for the outside flap.
- One front outside flap cover for your child to color.
- Pumpkin Life Cycle and labeled parts of pumpkin
- 7 vocabulary words and definitions
- Seed box pocket to store saved seeds
- About pumpkin pocket with facts
- Parts of pumpkin fact card
- Two Anatomy of a Pumpkin Notebooking Pages. One has facts filled in and one page is blank so that your child labels the part.
- Three pages of pumpkin note cards to use to identify the parts of a pumpkin.
- Two Life Cycle of a Pumpkin pages. One has facts filled in and one page is blank so that your child labels the cycle.
- One About Pumpkin Notebooking page for your children to write what interests them.
