You can do a lot more with a pumpkin than carve it.

Let's incorporate some learning.

Weigh your pumpkin. Bring a bathroom scale to your classroom. If your pumpkin is big, put it directly on the scale to weigh it. If it's not so big, ask someone to stand on the scale, note their weight, hand them the pumpkin and show children how to do subtraction to figure out how much it weighs. OF COURSE it will be too advanced for them, but you're exposing them to critical thinking. 🤓

Next make a chart and compare the weight of the pumpkin to other objects in the room. Ask children which they think will weigh more, then test it out with the scale if you can. Write the results on chart paper and post it on the wall.

You've just taught math, compare/contrast and literacy ✅

Roll your pumpkin.  Talk with the children about the shape of the pumpkin. Is it round like a ball? Will it roll like a ball? Try rolling it and see what happens. Let them experiment with rolling it. You could even get fancy and create a race track on the floor with making tape. Put your pumpkin on one side and a ball on the other and have a race. What happened? Give it a try and see. Record your results in a journal. 

You've just taught the scientific method of observation, making a prediction, experimentation, analyzing results and drawing a conclusion. ✅

Grow your pumpkin. When the fall decorations come down and it's time to dispose of your classroom pumpkin, toss it in a flower bed or somplace outside on the playground where children can watch it decompose. They'll love the way it looks, how bugs are drawn to it, how it gets all slimy and THEN they'll see that it creates a vine that might just grow another pumpkin.

You've just taught biology. ✅

So much to learn from a simple pumpkin. 🎃

Have fun!