Gardening with kids teaches them about science while enjoying family time outdoors. Kids get a chance to take ownership over their area of the vegetable garden and enjoy the resulting produce in nutritious meals and snacks. Making the experience enjoyable establishes a positive attitude toward vegetable gardening and may encourage picky eaters to enjoy more vegetables at dinner time.
Themed Garden
A themed vegetable garden helps guide the planning and gives the garden a specific purpose. Ideas include an herb garden, pasta garden or pizza garden. For the pasta or pizza garden, choose vegetables that would go into the dish when you cook it at harvest time. This might include tomatoes, basil, oregano, peppers and onions. When the vegetables are ripe, make your own pasta or pizza sauce from the garden and use the remaining herbs and vegetables to top the meal.
Hiding Spot
A living, growing hideaway in the vegetable garden creates a special spot just for your young gardeners. A sunflower hut is a colorful option for a live fort. Plant the sunflowers in a square, leaving the middle open and an opening along one side for the door. As the sunflowers grow, the hideout forms.
Kaboose recommends a bean teepee structure for varieties of beans that vine. The site recommends using bamboo stakes between 3 and 6 feet long, placed into the ground in a circle. Leave a door in the teepee about 2 feet wide.Tie the tops of the stakes together to create the teepee. Tie the bean plants loosely to the stakes to encourage them to grow over the teepee. The beans will eventually cover the teepee for a private hideaway for your child.
Kids' Area
Giving your child his own garden plot allows him even more control in the vegetable garden. A raised garden bed just for him creates a small, defined space for his vegetables. Let him choose the vegetables he wants to grow and allow him to handle the planting, even if it means crooked rows. Provide him tips and guidance without taking over his garden area.
Garden Journal
A garden journal documents the growth and results of the gardening efforts. Take lots of pictures of your child working in the garden, from the planting phase to the harvesting, to include in the journal. Encourage your child to make notes in the journal over the summer to document the experience. If your child cooks some of the vegetables she grows, include the recipes in the journal and pictures of the meal preparation.
Member Comments