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eNewsletter | Free Catalog | ||
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IN THIS ISSUE |
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Dear Organic Gardeners
Reflections on the origins and responsiblities of Earth Day... |
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Tips for Gardening with Kids Activities for getting children involved in the garden without undoing your hard work...
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Companion Planting Adding diversity in the form of plants that can be "so happy together"...
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Bio Control Gardening is too an X-game! Suggestions for employing biology to control pests in the garden...
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Farm Report: April '06 Rain falls and the farm staff addresses water issues... |
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News & Views
Earth Day events are happening all over the country. We've compliled a list to get you headed in the right direction and give you planning ideas for next year... |
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Please send letters regarding this eNewsletter to: Scott Vlaun, Editor. |
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"Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: the roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that." |
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Fun Tips for Including Kids in Your Garden
by Emily Skelton
My sons are quite young yet at three and a half years and thirteen months old, but already I can see they want to help in the garden, to participate, to explore, and to get dirty. Sometimes, however, what they call help is a lot like damage control for me! Today I got home and mentioned to my husband that I had not watered the lettuce seeds I had planted two days ago and that I had better do that or they would not come up. He said, "Uh, did you plant those seeds in the framed bed by the pump house?" "Yes," I answered, bracing myself. "Well, Gabe has been raking in that bed today..." They are so endearing. They are trying to be helpful, and yet it can be incredibly frustrating too.In an attempt to help us all have a good time and to educate our children about gardening, I have written down a few ideas for activities you can initiate to create a safe "container" that your kids can play and learn within, yet hopefully not do too much damage to your garden in the process. Included below are some ideas on:
- Activities with kids related to gardening,
- Homemade, kid-friendly garden accessories, and
- Indoor, garden-related games to test kids' gardening skills.
Garden Related Activities for Kids:
Grow a Yam
If you have a leftover, uncooked sweet potato or yam in your refrigerator that is not too dry or shriveled, you can actually sprout it and grow it inside the house as a vining house plant. You can also transplant it outside after all danger of frost is past. This is a variation on the sprouting of an avocado pit in a glass of water (which is also fun). You need a yam, a water glass or bowl large enough to fit the yam in, several toothpicks, and water. Identify the end of the yam that comes to a point and was attached to the vine. Place this end in the water a few inches under the surface. Press the toothpicks in to hold the yam in place. Keep the water clean by rinsing it every day. Once the plant is growing you can pot it up in soil.
Roots Exposed
It is exciting and educational for children to see what is happening with a plant under the soil surface. It is not always easy to see that, unless we dig up a plant to look at its roots. One easy way to observe roots is to grow the plant in a clear pot. There are several options for creating a clear planter pot. Here is one idea. If you have ever purchased a store-bought cake, you know they come with a clear plastic cover. This makes a nice size pot for this activity (buy the big round cake). It helps to have two plastic covers sandwiched together for a more stable pot; however, this may lead to condensation build-up between the two layers. Punch holes in the bottom for drainage. Easy plants to start are peas, corn, or potato eyes. With peas you can sometimes see nodules on the rootsą. These are small round bumps on the root surface that house beneficial bacteria that help the plant take up nitrogen (part of the plant's food source). If you break open these little nodules and they are red inside, that indicates that the bacteria are busy processing the nitrogen˛. Corn is interesting to observe because the roots are so incredibly long compared to the above ground plant. Plant these seeds along the edge so that the roots will be easily visible. Take note of how the roots grow very quickly and sometimes are deep in the soil long before the plant emerges above the soil surface.Homemade Kid-Friendly Garden Accessories:
Decorated Sun Visors
At the local craft store or any variety store, you can purchase plain sun visors. I have seen them in fashionable foam rubber and also rigid plastic in lots of different colors. You can use a hot glue gun to attach foam shapes, such as a soccer ball or football; use the foam shapes to create your child's favorite animal or to fashion it into a crown or tiara. My son loves to put stickers on everything, including a sun visor. He will actually wear this unique form of sun protection in the garden for longer than fifteen minutes.Quick Birdbath
Invert a twelve-inch round pot in the garden where you want to have a bath for birds. Place on top of this pot, right side up, a larger round pot. Sixteen inches is a good size. Place a saucer on top of this pot, also right side up. Fill the shallow saucer with water and enjoy the birds that come to bathe and drink. If this set-up needs more stability, pound a two-foot-long rebar or other stake into the ground and then slip the pots over the rebar through the pots' drainage hole. Make sure the bar is below the level of the rim, so you can still place the saucer on top.
Indoor/Rainy Day Gardening Skill Testers:
Download these printable, one-page games for kids 5 to 95. (The size of each pdf file is noted in parenthesis.)
How My Garden Changes (73.7 kb) gives children a space to paste on photographs of their garden at different times throughout the season: in spring, at mid-season, and during harvest time.
Common Garden Insects (193.6 kb) is a great opportunity for children (and grown-ups) to identify critters they know and be challenged to learn something new about pests, or beneficials, that they might not be familiar with.
Scarecrow Scramble (213.6 kb) provides an opportunity for children to help Sammy Scarecrow unscramble eight garden-related words. (Answers are provided, upside-down, at the bottom of the page.)Enjoy!
Emily Skelton
Seed Cleaning and Quality Coordinator
Notes:
1. Jim Deacon, "The Microbial World: The Nitrogen cycle and Nitrogen fixation," Helios (2001), http://helios.bto.ed.ac.uk/bto/microbes/nitrogen.htm This site, http://helios.bto.ed.ac.uk, has lots of other interesting info that you may want to explore with your children.
2. John Arthur Harrison, "The Nitrogen Cycle: Of Microbes and Men," Visionlearning Vol. EAS-2 (4) (2003), http://www.visionlearning.com/library/module_viewer.php?mid=98.
Photo captions: (1)Gabe raking a bed freshly planted with lettuce seed (2)The exposed root nodules of a clover plant (3) A colorful sun visor
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