For Educators: Teaching Units & Lesson Plans: Plants Lesson Plan 4: Take 2 Herbs and Call Me in the Morning OBJECTIVES Students will:
MATERIALS
Note to teacher: You will need to obtain ahead of time the chamomile plant or another herb. If you cannot get chamomile, you can substitute another herb (such as a mint) that would taste good as a tea. BACKGROUND Students will make a tea recipe and a compress. While there are many different types of herbs from which to make tea, the recipe below uses chamomile. The chamomile flower can be used as an herb or spice. A topical salve (an ointment that soothes or heals) made from the flowers is a traditional remedy for treating hemorrhoids and wounds. Fresh and dried chamomile flowers are used as a bath additive, in compresses, and as a calming tea (see recipe below). This tea has been used worldwide by mothers to relieve their babies' painful colic. Other traditional remedies of this flower tea help relax the bowels and relieve cramps, irritability, and inflammation (Hobbs, p. 70). OPENING Homework from previous lesson: students should have brought in at least two items from home made from plants. Start this lesson with a discussion of what they have brought from home. Display chamomile flower. Ask, "Would you drink this plant?" Tell students they are going to learn how to use plants to heal. PROCEDURE
The Euro-American rationale of the compress: the herb was thought to draw the poisons/impurities to the surface so they could be eliminated. Note: If the students really enjoy making herbal remedies, students could research other simple remedies and make them at home or in school. Another simple activity would be to have students crush lavender using a mortar and pestle. Have students place the crushed herb in a small square of cotton (4 x 4 inches). Tie up with string. Students can sniff the lavender and use it as a "headache pillow." CLOSING Note that the single most widely used medicine today— aspirincomes from the bark of the white willow tree and was first discovered by American Indians. SUGGESTED FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT To be assigned as homework: look up a plant in your region of the country that has curing properties. Write a brief explanation of it. Draw a picture of it and label it. |