Note: This is the 5th and final installment of the series. Tips and topics to enhance the enjoyment and education of gardening with children.
It is best to incorporate both flowers and vegetables in a child's garden to reach everyone's interest. Children love bright colors–the brighter the better! The bright cheery annual flowers, such as cosmos, marigolds, zinnias, nasturtiums and snapdragons will almost certainly please your child. These east-to-grow, low-maintenance 'color spots' are available in six packs of small starters, or they can be purchased in 4" pots that are normally already in bud or bloom for much quicker results.
Coleus is a fast growing annual and produces a rainbow of colored foliage from the moment it begins growing. The variety of colors is so nearly complete that no matter what your child's favorite color is you can probably find a Coleus that is just right. These plants are probably one of the best examples to us as a teaching aid. They are easily started and grown from seed, either in the garden, or as a houseplant. Although a Coleus produces a stalk of pretty blue flowers, the plant will last longer if the spikes are pinched off. Explain to your child that it is better, and healthier for the plant if the flowers are removed. This is a perfect plant for a youngster to learn how to pinch or disbud plants, because it would be next to impossible for them to inflict serious damage to this almost indestructible plant.
Size extremes–how tall is your child? Three feet? Can you imagine how good they will feel about their accomplishment when they grow a big ol' sunflower that towers over them by several feet? Sunflowers are easy to grow and will be several feet high in no time at all. It will take a while before your child actually has a 'sun flower' on their plant, but the rapid growth rate of these plants will be sure to keep their interest. By the end of the summer, they can either munch down on their own homegrown seeds or save them to feed the hungry birds during the coming winter.
On the small side, there are several types of miniature pumpkins that are both cute and useful, like Jack-Be-Little and Munchkin and a small white one, Baby Boo. Hens and chicks is a succulent plant that spread by producing offsets that look like miniatures of the mother plant. It is hardy, doesn't require much water and will grow to fill in nooks and crannies in almost any sunny part of a garden. "Yellow Pear" is a cherry tomato that produces loads of sweet, bite-sized yellow fruits. Children enjoy picking and munching them right from the plant.
Wonderful scent can be obtained with lemon balm or mint when you show them how to crumble a leaf between their fingers. Most herbs are easily grown, unfortunately, many of them tend to be invasive (especially the different mints). Many flowers also have wonder smells to be enjoyed. Four o'clocks are fragrant and their seeds are big enough for children to plant easily to learn seed collection.
Different textures are also available. The soft and woolly foliate of Lamb's Ears; a perennial, with its fuzzy succulent leaves and silvery green color is a nice edging plant for a flower garden or path. Children love touching and stroking it because it really does feel like a lamb's ear. It will come back next year. It will be the constant recipient of gentle strokes and attention by your child, from the moment it is brought home from the nursery. Other plants are rough and some have prickles. Kids are "proud as peacocks" when they grow a fruit or vegetable to share with the family at mealtime. Zinnias, marigolds or salvia are perfect for cut flowers. This helps to keep them blooming, and it's great to give "gifts" for Mom or a friend right from "my own garden." For something spectacular to a child, plant a few sunflowers for picking and keep scissors or garden shears handy! Children learn how to garden and enjoy beautifying their indoor and outdoor environment.
Children delight in the unexpected. Many of our favorite garden vegetables are now available in unusual colors or sizes. Speckled beans, yellow pear tomatoes, red carrots, miniature cucumbers are all fun even for experienced adult gardeners. The funny colors just add spice to the experience. Odd or unusual vegetables can spark interest, like spaghetti squash, cherry tomatoes, birdhouse and other ornamental gourds.
Gardens do not have to be planted in a square or rectangle. A "pizza" garden can be planted in a circle and divided into wedge-shaped sections for pizza ingredients. Or, use a tripod support to train climbing plants such as sugar snap peas, beans or nasturtiums to grow a live teepee. Planting sunflowers in a circle or square, leaving space for entry, and tying the tops loosely together near the heads can make sunflower houses or "hideouts." The floor can be covered with a section of old carpet or planted with clover or thyme. How about a critter garden? Let me see–we could plant our Lamb's Ears in this garden. A CATnip or CAT mint would definitely fit the category. TIGER lilies, ELEPHANT ears, SnapDRAGONS, MONKEY flower, HENS and CHICKS, BUTTERFLY Weed. There are enough different animal plants that you child should be able to keep quite content and busy with this theme.
If you have enough room in the garden, gourds are a good choice. After harvesting, they can be decorated and used as birdhouses or autumn table decorations. Birdhouse gourds produce fruit 10 to 12 inches long that can be dried and kept for decoration. This plant can be grown on a trellis as a vine or can sprawl on the ground. There are also other gourd varieties available in different colors and sizes, which might appeal to children who would rather look at their vegetables than eat them!
If the plot is to be ongoing from year to year incorporate some perennials including bulbs like tulip, daffodils, crocuses and hyacinths to grab their interest first think in the spring. It makes for a good jumpstart for next year's garden.
I would be remiss not to mention the importance of safety in the garden. Tools can cause injury, so teach responsibility in handling them at the very beginning. The rest are just common sense rules. Don't get overtired. Take breaks, especially in the heat. Wear sunscreen and a hat with a brim as protection from the sun. Dehydration is a very real danger, so drink plenty of fluids and don't skip lunch. Spritz bottles or wet washcloths at intervals can be a nice pick-me-up.
The benefits of gardening for children are so many it would be impossible to list them. They learn the rhythms of nature, the character-building virtues of patience, responsibility, and sharing. They also experience the acceptance of loss and the joys of seeing planted seeds and bulbs sprout and eventually bloom. Gardening offers a vehicle to teach many things including: science, botany, ethno botany, language, history, recycling (composting), math (calculating volumes, numbers of plants for seeds, weights, areas, etc.), agriculture, entomology, plant pathology, soils and lots more.
Of course, science can be taught in many enjoyable ways. The life cycle of a plant, from the germination of a seed to the production of fruit and to its eventual death, mirrors all events in life. How does a plant grow? What does it need? How do environmental events like heat, cold, drought and pollution affect the growth of plants? Hundreds of very simple experiments can be done in a garden. When a child asks a question, help them to suggest answers and design a simple experiment to test their theory.
