I whole-heartedly believe humans were not made to live their lives inside all day – especially children.
Yet, we force youth to live the first two decades of their lives in a building with limited access to the outdoors a majority of the day.
We can do better!
School Gardens provide an environment of wealth, health, and fun for children of all ages.
There is an abundance of activities and lessons that can be taught in a garden. Obviously, science can be used to tell how the plants grow, their life cycle, photosynthesis, geology, environment, and more. Math can be used by measuring plants, comparing sixes, adding pieces together, working with angles, and more. History can be used in sooo many ways, as much of our history as humans evolves around food. What did ancient societies eat? How did they farm? What traditions did they follow? These can all be discussed in a school garden. Art, reading, and exercise can also be conducted in and through the school garden.
School gardens are also a place for little ones to regulate themselves emotionally. When a child gets the opportunity to move, they simultaneously relieve stress and anxiety. It is no secret that being around nature is scientifically proven to help humans remain balanced, calm, and happy.
School gardens also teach us basic life skills like how to grow our own food (obvi), how to harvest, and how to cook a meal.
School gardens are way underutilized. If it were up to me, every school would be required to have a school garden – and use it!
Here’s my FAVORITE resource for all things School Garden related: kidsgardening.com
Another one is bluewatermelonproject.org – I actually had the honor of completing an internship with this organization last year. They have excellent resources for implementing garden related topics into school lesson guides! Additionally, they put together an even every year where children have to come up with a recipe that follows both monetary and nutritional guidelines that the school follows using the food grown in the gardens. They come up with some AWESOME dishes.
Get those kids out of the fluorescent lighting and into the sun!
As always!
In Soil We Trust,
Tiffany
Bring Back Soil 
I blame the car culture. When I were a lad mmmf years ago, I was often kicked out of the house to ‘go play’ (no doubt to give my parents a chance to have a breather).
Nowadays, parents are scared to let their children out of their sight because of scary boogymen (the risk of which, while real, is minimal but exaggerated by the mass media news [sic])… and they ironically drive their chilluns to skool ‘because the roads are so dangerous’ – go figure!
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I could totally see this! Yes! Great points. I think about that a lot actually. I wish society wasn’t so afraid. If more of us were out and about, there’d be a greater sense of community and trust, and therefore more safety and protection. I bet less depression and anxiety, too.
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In my view it would be better if local parks, instead of being closed at night, were patrolled by fearless old grannies wielding stout walking sticks. Critical thinking would be taught in every school from an early age. And once the students grok that, move on to risk assessment.
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