Vegetables

Key Stage 1

Meaning

Vegetables are edible parts of a plant that do not contain seeds, so they are not fruit.

Singular Noun: Vegetable

Plural Noun: Vegetables

About Vegetables

Vegetables are a very important part of the human diet and you should eat 5 portions of them every day.

Vegetables can be the root, leaves or flower of a plant.

Examples

A Radish is a bulb that can be eaten.	A Parsnip is a root vegetable.	Broccoli is the flower of a cabbage.
An Onion is a bulb that can be eaten.	Lettuce is the leaves of a plant.	A carrot is a root vegetable that grows underground.

Note for Teachers

Many vegetables are also referred to as fruit. Fruit is specifically the part containing seeds (the ovary of the plant) but a vegetable is any edible part of the plant. You may wish to either highlight or avoid these depending on the abilities of individual students. The following are examples of vegetables that are also technically fruit:

Tomato, Peppers, Cucumber, Aubergine, Pumpkin, Marrow, Courgette, Chili.

Mushrooms are often mistaken for vegetables which also leads children to falsely identify them as a plant. They are in fact a fungus.