Most kids these days would rather be
tapping away on a computer keyboard or waging war against monsters on their Xbox.
Ask them if they want to spend some time outside, enjoying the fresh air and
learning more about their environment, and you will probably be met with a
blank expression. You shouldn’t give up, though, because fresh air is good for
them and anything you can do to foster a love of gardening now will stand them
in good stead for the future.
Make Gardening Interesting and Fun
In order to encourage kids to enjoy
gardening you need to make it interesting and pitch activities to their level
of understanding. Older kids might be persuaded to help out with some digging
in the borders or some other type of manual labour, but younger kids won’t be
able to do anything of that nature. However, small children will enjoy
harvesting vegetables, planting seedling and picking flowers. So if you want to
teach your kids all about gardening, here are a few simple tips and activities
you can all do together.
A Flower Growing Competition
There is one type of flower that is
universally appealing to children of all ages: the sunflower. Sunflowersare incredibly easy to grow from seeds and once fully grown, they can reach
a seriously impressive height. Young kids love to grow sunflowers, so why not
have a sunflower growing competition? Give each family member a sunflower
seedling and plant it in a pot (to make it even more fun, let your child
decorate his pot before the seedling is planted).
Sunflowers, like any other flower, need
careful tending in order to achieve optimum growth. This is a great opportunity
to teach your child about the importance of looking after plants and other
living things: as long as they water their seedling, it will grow into a beautiful
flower. And once the sunflowers have reached their full height, you can see
which flower is the tallest!
Give Your Child a Garden
A good way to encourage a love of gardening
is to let your child have their very own patch of garden. Pick a small plot in
the sun that will be easy for them to take care of. Or, if you don’t have much
of a garden, let them have a window box or large
container where they can grow flowers or herbs. Allow your child to choose from
a selection of seeds and then help them to sow the seeds. Watching seeds
germinate and then grow into mature plants is exciting and a great science
lesson to boot.
You might also wish to buy your child his
or her own gardening tools and equipment – visitGlut.co.uk for gardening gifts to suit all ages. Child-sized watering cans,
hand forks and spades are all perfect for little green fingers, and the more
you make gardening fun, the more likely they are to cultivate a passion for
growing plants outdoors.
Always supervise younger children in the
garden, especially if there are toxic garden pesticides stored in sheds and
other buildings outdoors.
I see kids love playing with dirt, am sure when they get a chance to experience the fun of gardening, they would not mind leaving their keyboards temporarily
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