Gardening in the Classroom {giveaway closed}


Have you ever gardened with your students?  I haven't.  A teacher at my school last year, Kelly, wrote several grants and with her hard work, was able to transform our dull courtyard into a beautiful garden.


Kelly was transfered to a different school this year, so it is up to all of us teachers to keep up the garden.  When I told her I didn't know anything about gardening, let alone doing it with 30+ kids, she told me to start small and do container gardening.  I dabbled a bit over the summer.  My son and I planted sunflowers in a plastic greenhouse, then transferred them to a big, self watering container from Ikea when they had sprouted.  They did well throughout the fall, but have been looking pretty dumpy all winter long.
image from Ikea.com

Then I found this book, Gardening with Little Miss Greenfingers.  It's an eBook filled with wonderful tips for container gardening.  The 85 page book has ten chapters, covering all the basics from supplies you will need, places to put your containers for optimal growth, and the best culinary herbs to grow.  In the introduction, the author, Anja Koch states:
"A lot of popular herbs like Chives, Parsley or Oregano are surprisingly easy to grow and need little care. Little Miss Greenfingers will show you the little tricks to achieve successful herb gardening! At the end of this book you will be able to grow your own supply of healthy and delicious herbs for cooking or maybe some healthy herbal teas."
I plan to grow these herbs with my students at school and then plant them in containers in our garden.  Once the herbs are ready to pick, students will get to bring the fresh herbs home for their families to cook into delicious food.  It will be a great learning experience for the children and will help the families have access to free, fresh, and healthy herbs for dinner.  A win-win for us all!
image from gardening-advice.net
Anja has graciously agreed to give away 10 copies of her ebook to my followers!  Here is what you will need to do:
  1. Follow Anja Koch on Twitter (@akoch13), 
  2. Like her website www.gardening-advice.net (there is a FB like button on the top left of the page)
  3. Subscribe to her newsletter at www.gardening-advice.net (find the sign-up form on the right side of the page)
After you have done all three, just fill out this simple form letting me know and you will be entered in the giveaway.  All submissions are due on Tuesday, April 3rd and I will use random.org to select 10 winners.  Good luck! GIVEAWAY IS CLOSED.

Have you gardened with kids before?  What is your favorite thing to grow? Flowers? Vegetables? Herbs?  Do you have any other tips for me before I start this project?


I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

4 comments

  1. I love this! I taught summer school a few years ago and we turned it into a summer camp to make it more exciting. Each grade level was given a raised bed out back behind our gazebo to plant veggies in, plus we all worked together to plant flowers. It was really overgrown and neglected, so it took quite a bit of work but it was sooo fun. We weren't entirely successful with the corn, but most of the smaller plants did well. Checking the garden gave the kids something to look forward to, and something to anticipate when school started again in August too.

    Good luck on your adventure!
    Christi ツ
    Ms. Fultz’s Corner

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    1. It's so great for the kids to learn how to garden and grow their own food! Your summer program sounds like it was a ton of fun!

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  2. Oh, I love this! I once worked with a teacher who wrote a grant to get a greenhouse. Then our district closed our school. The good news is he was able to take it with him. I have no gardening space at my school, but this inspires me anyway.
    Artistry of Education

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    1. That's what is so great about container gardening - you can put the container anywhere!

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