ScienceGrade 2ages 7–8
🖐️ Five senses
Most children easily name seeing and hearing, but smell, taste, and touch get mixed up or forgotten, and 'thinking' sometimes gets counted as a sense when it isn't one.
Try this lesson freeNo card needed. The first lesson is free.
Download on the App StoreWhat your child learns
- Eyes to see, ears to hear.
- Nose to smell, tongue to taste, skin to touch.
- That is five. Not three.
- Thinking matters — it is not one of the five senses.
The mistake most kids make here
Thinking is a sense, or there are only three senses.
Try one question
How many main senses are there?
How many senses
- 3
- 5
- 12
Answer
5 — That's it. Five: see hear smell taste touch.
How Maya teaches it
Your child tells Maya what they did in class. She teaches this topic at her desk, asks questions with tappable answers, and when the answer is wrong she explains why that answer was tempting instead of saying “try again”. She remembers what did not land and comes back to it.
Your child has it when they can: Name the five senses.
How to help at home
Seeing and hearing are the senses children use most consciously, so they come to mind first. Smell, taste, and touch tend to work in the background, which is why kids often undercount them.
Tonight, do a quick five-round game: close your eyes and have your child describe what they notice using only one sense at a time — what do you hear, what do you smell, what does this feel like, and so on. Naming the sense out loud each round builds the list.
If your child says thinking is a sense, ask 'do your eyes, ears, nose, tongue, or skin do the thinking, or does something else?' That question separates the five body parts that gather information from the brain that uses it.
A good sign they've got it: they can list all five senses without help and match each one to a body part — eyes, ears, nose, tongue, skin.
Questions parents ask
- Why does my child forget smell, taste, or touch when listing the senses?
- Sight and hearing are used more consciously and come to mind fastest, while smell, taste, and touch often work quietly in the background and get overlooked unless practiced by name.
- Is thinking a sense?
- No — thinking happens in the brain using information the five senses gather, but it isn't itself one of the ways the body takes in information from the world.
- What body part goes with each sense?
- Eyes for sight, ears for hearing, nose for smell, tongue for taste, and skin for touch — five senses, five body parts.
- How does Maya teach this differently from a chart?
- Maya asks how many main senses there are and checks the answer against the five body parts, so a child who says 'three' or includes thinking gets a chance to recount rather than just being told the number.
No card needed. The first lesson is free.
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Sources: Next Generation Science Standards