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When digging in a garden it's not uncommon to
find a potato or carrot left from a previous harvest. Be on the lookout
for such treasures in your garden. They offer great teaching moments. The
children love discovering things in the gardens. They always ask if they
can take them home. Sometimes, if there is an abundance (like clippings
of basil) we will. Usually we let them take them back to the classroom
where they can wash and eat them as a group. They vie for the honor
of carrying a single carrot.
Many of the gardens had garlic planted along the
edges (It looks like green onion.) and it would not be uncommon to find
carrots as well.
If it's in the spring (and they're left over from last
year), if the potatoes are firm, and unscathed, replant them and mark the
spot. They will sprout new leaves, and in the fall there will be
a bunch more to dig up and use. You can recognize carrots by their
lacy tops. Left alone they will grow a plant 2-3 feet tall and produce
white flowers, like Queen Ann's Lace from which they descend.
If you come across a bean plant with baby beans,
show the babies to the students. I then pick a bean and pop it in my
mouth and ask who else would like to taste a baby bean. If you come across
a bean or pea plant and find some of the beans have dried on the plant.
Take the dried beans or peas out of the pod and plant them in your garden.
Chances are they will sprout in a couple of weeks. This is one more step
toward showing children the cycle of a seed.
Weeding:
Show students one
kind of weed and have them pull only that weed until they are all gone.
This will give them the chance to know and recognize the weed. While
looking for the one kind, they will begin to notice the different shapes
and colors of the leaves of other plants. If the garden has been watered
recently, they should be able to remove most weeds by firmly grabbing the
stem at the base of the soil and pulling. If it is too dry
to easily pull the weeds like grass, it is not a good day for weeding.
Adult volunteers can use trowels or garden forks to loosen weeds
i.e. dandelion that have roots that may break off even if the soil is relatively
moist. Even working with small groups of students, it is not a good idea
to have them work with tools while pulling weeds (At least not 4th grade
and younger). In our experience, their goal always becomes digging in the
soil rather than pulling weeds.
Weeding the garden teaches students to identify
weeds apart from garden plants. Teach students the importance of weed removal
to reduce competition with garden plants, to prevent growth of new weeds,
and to improve garden appearance. For older students it is an opportunity
to practice identifying the difference between the plants. Weeds
have different types of roots and leaves, just as flowers and vegetables
do. |
