Gardening is a wonderful life skill to teach your children
-- one that could yield a tasty and healthy harvest all summer
long! Your lessons in the vegetable garden can also plant seeds
in the areas of academics, character, and spiritual life that
will produce fruit throughout your child's life.
If you can't do a full garden this year, consider raising a
tomato plant in a container or a couple of zucchini plants to
share with all your neighbors.
Happy gardening!
Lessons in the Vegetable Garden
Gardening with your children provides opportunities to teach
and train them in several areas such as:
* Life Skills
* Academics
* Character
* Spiritual Life
Unit Studies
If you want to take a more formal approach to your lessons
in gardening, or want to augment your own lessons, consider one of
these unit studies.
Gardens Unit Study by Amanda Bennett. (CD-ROM)
www.unitstudy.com/gardens.htm Braden Road Farm's Gardening Unit Study and Award Program.
(Printed Format)
www.bradenroad.com Botany Unit Study on all aspects of plants.
AlwrightPublishing.notlong.com Unit Study on Plants. (Online)
www.home2teach.com/UnitStudyOnPlants.htm Spring Into Gardening Unit Study. (Online)
www.homeschoollearning.com/units/un...ng_garden.shtml Planning Your Garden
One of the lessons that gardening can teach your children is
the value of planning.
Like many jobs (painting, for instance), the planning and
preparation may take as long and be even more important than the
actual work of brushing on the paint or putting the seed into the
ground.
Considering the following factors in planning your garden
will save you time, money, and energy.
1. Research
* Look at seed catalogs, displays of seed packets, gardening
books, or the Internet to become familiar with different
varieties of garden vegetables.
* Visit garden centers and nurseries.
* Talk to experienced gardeners in your area.
- Invite grandparents or another family to dinner to share
their gardening know-how with you.
2. Choose Vegetables
Discuss as a family:
* What vegetables (and herbs) does your family like to eat?
(In the advantages of a garden that we listed in our last
issue, we forgot to include the superior, fresh taste of
home-grown produce.)
* What vegetables offer greater health benefits and should be
included in your diet?
USDA National Nutrient Database. Look up nutrients of
various vegetables.
www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search * What vegetables can offer the best savings or superior
quality compared to bought produce?
* What vegetables do you have space to grow?
* What vegetables grow best in your climate?
3. Determine Amount
You do not have to plant all the seeds in each seed packet
you buy. Consider the following questions and then see the back
of the seed packet for the expected yield of each vegetable.
* How much can your family eat fresh as it is harvested?
* How much do you want to give away or sell?
* How much do you want to preserve by canning, freezing, or
drying?
4. Make a Commitment
* How much time to you have to devote to garden care?
- Estimate the number of hours per day or week that your
garden care will take.
* How much money are you able and willing to spend on garden
supplies and water?
- Make a budget.
* Who will be responsible?
- Assign specific chores or a section of your garden to
specific family members.
5. Find a Location
* Determine how much space you need to grow the types and
amounts of vegetables you have chosen.
- For example, if you grow corn or spreading pumpkin and
squash, you will need much more space than just a "salad
garden" of lettuce, tomatoes, green onions, radishes,
cucumbers, and carrots.
* Determine how much money, time, energy, and commitment will
be required for the size of your garden.
- Novice gardeners need to start small; however, "small"
has been suggested to be anywhere between 12'x16' to
20'x30'.
* Find a space that gets 8 hours of sun (unshaded by buildings
or trees), adequate water supply, and good drainage.
* If you do not have a lot of space, consider plantings in
borders around your lawn, in containers (e.g., tomatoes)
or on trellises, and in several smaller patches.
- Small, well-maintained gardens with successive plantings
can produce more than large gardens that are overridden with
weeds.
Online Resources for Patio and Container Gardening
www.nationalgardenmonth.org/contain...iner/index.html www.garden.org/howtos/index.php?q=show&id=1299 AggieHorticulture.notlong.com 6. Allocate Space and Map It
* Draw your garden to scale on graph paper and label each row.
- Use 1/4 inch = 1 foot or tape two pieces of paper together
and use a larger scale.
* Make three maps for spring, summer, and fall plantings, or
use one map with color codes for each succession plantings.
* Allocate space for each vegetable based on its yield and the
amount you can use.
- Check the planting and maturing time for early and late
vegetables to see if you can make a second planting after
the first is harvested.
* Draw space for each vegetable in rows (narrow or wide) or in
blocks.
* Draw space for paths between rows or every other row.
- Be sure you and your children can comfortably reach all
the plants from the paths.
* Mark your rows to run east and west, with the taller
vegetables on the north side.
* Group vegetables together according to similar need.
- Some plants do well with overhead watering; others do not.
- Tall sun-loving plants can be interspersed with shorter
ones that like some shade.
- Companion planting can allow certain plants to protect and
enhance each other's growth.
www.attra.org/attra-pub/complant.html www.growitgold.com/resources/compan...ionplants.shtml Online Resource on Planning a Garden
www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/tog/planning.html SeedwayPlan.notlong.com