diy kiddo blended {herbal} tea

Oh! I think this was my most favorite activity of the year!The children were tickled to spend a day investigating all things tea. We set up our tea set in the play kitchen, painted with tea, sampled tea and then made our own blends complete with hand drawn labels. The tea enthusiasm carried out to the ned of the school year and that little tin tea set got a BIG work out!

I gathered an assortment of dried kid-friendly herbs used for tisanes at our local natural market. If you have a Whole Foods or other natural market or co-op in your town, check out their bulk bins. A small scoop goes a long way and the cost is well under a dollar. We did this activity after we sampled our teas. I set out the dried herbs on our table using jar lids as holders. I wrote on the table with a dry erase marker labeling each herb so that I could remember which was which and add an element of print to the activity (one of my kiddos is a reader).

I held up each lid and anounced the name of the herb. From there we talked about what we saw. The children described the herbs with a lot of enthusiasm and loved leaning over the herbs to take in the scent. They use their pinching fingers (at first) to add bits to their tea jars (empty spice jars from World Market) and soon ended up scooping and pouring large portions into their jars. Make sure you clean the table before you begin. Some of the children grasped and scooped whichever herb was closest while others purposefully chose what they wanted, how much, and when. It was all sorts of cool!

After they filled their jars, we put the lids on and brought the markers and labels out. I used these Martha Stewart labels which I found at Michaels. They have a lot of heft and are pretty with a bit less tack then mailing labels (so that the jars can be reused for some other purpose). After the kiddos decorated their labels they named their teas and I wrote the names over their art. We had Daddy Tea, Spring Tea and E's Tea to name a few.

The Nitty Gritty:
*dried edibles and herbs such as spearmint, rose, and chamomile
*clean empty spice jars like these
*shallow dishes or lids for sorting
*blank labels like these
*markers

painting with tea

As a part of our tea study we put away the paints and painted with bags of tea instead. The colors were so pretty and the room smelled quite fruity. The children experienced a number of senses as they painted with the bags.

I get to class up to an hour before the kiddos arrived so was able to heat up some water in the microwave warm enough to help the tea develop but cool enough that the bags would be cool to touch when the kiddos arrived.  You can do this with your kiddos at home as a science experiment by placing small containers of water containing a tea bag each outside in the sun. The children could make predictions on how long the tea would take to turn the water a happy color, what color each tea would turn the water, and what the breed tea would smell like. We used single-serve applesauce containers for our tea (the kiddos love saving their containers for our room).

I covered a table with white paper and popped the tea paint within reach on top. I am an avid tea drinker and friends send me tea so did not spend a penny but if you are looking to purchase tea for such a project basic black and green tea are different enough in color and scent to engage your kiddos (especially if you pick up a blend such as jasmine or pumpkin spice chai) and are easy enough to find at your grocery or dollar store. The red tea up above is a rooibos from Mighty Leaf. I really like Mighty Leaf as the fabric bags make it easy to see all the pretty inside. If you find you are without tea, to save some moolah I recommend a variety pack such as this (I am not affiliated with the company, I just really like their tea)!

What you need:
*2-4 varieties of tea in bags
*water for brewing
*heat or the sun to help brew the tea
*time (about an hour) to let the warm/hot tea cool
*small clear containers such as custard cups or clean single-use applesauce cups
*white paper, the thicker the better

flowering tea observation {in the classroom}

Have you ever brewed the loveliness that is flowering tea? As a part of our tea investigation I brought in a ball of flowering jasmine maidens from Harney & Sons. To brew flowering tea for drinking you should have a clear pot and hot water. We were not going to drink the tea (can you imagine three year olds hopped up on caffeine?) so I used my pretty mini pot and then transferred the flowering ball into a large ball jar.

The tea brews just like a regular tea bag but is much prettier. To keep the jar of tea from getting cloudy with green tea, after the ball opened up I discarded the tea into a mug for myself and refilled the jar with cooler water. This was repeated throughout the day so that the kiddos could observe and comment on the pretty jar of tea.

Harney and Sons flowering tea is not really priced to waste but you can now flowering tea at your local grocery store or online. Up above is my nifty single serve tea pot which we used for the initial brewing. The children asked a lot of questions and marveled at the idea that a person sewed the leaves together so that when we brew it the leaves would open up and bloom. Many of the children believed that the tea was a flower that was picked just like that. Some decided it was fairy tea. They also loved the scent of the tea, jasmine tea does smell quite pretty. We saved our flowering tea for the next class to view, it lasted two days before becoming hyper-bogged down with the water. Stay tuned for more tea investigation!

tea tasting in the classroom

 We spent a day investigating tea. There was tea scented play dough, tea painting, tea blending, and tea tasting...herbal of course. It was such a treat for the kiddos to explore tea this way. I do believe this was my favorite theme to set up.

We sampled three kinds of herbal tea and talked about them before brewing. The children learned new vocabulary as we discussed teas, tisanes, flowers, buds, etc. We sampled a globe amaranth with a little bit of sugar for sweetening, chrysanthemum tea, and eight treasures tea (which includes waaaaay too many pieces of rock candy/sugar. I removed all but 1 for brewing). I used a couple of small tea pots like this only smaller and less expensive (I picked them up from World Market but htey no longer carry them) and we sampled our tea from sake mugs which are perfectly sized (and priced) for wee hands. The children were quite solemn as they sampled the tea. Their favorite to look at was the globe amaranth. Their favorite to drink was the chrysanthemum though not a drop was left from each flavor. They even asked for seconds. The teas were brewed at the required temperatures but sampled after a bit of cooling so as not to cause any burning. This was so much fun! Have yo uever sampled tea in your classroom?