The Master Gardener
By Allison Yeckel, Penn State Extension Master Gardener of Washington County
People thrive when they’re making a difference, children included. Teaching children how to make a positive impact on the world starts at home. These opportunities are plentiful, and can include gardening. The sense of higher purpose is introduced easily with vegetable gardening, and can apply to regular flowers, too. Gardening activities can occur no matter the time of year, so include your children in planning and tasks. Give him/her a specific job to do, but also the autonomy to decide how to get it done. Emphasize the importance of this job, but try to avoid introducing the fear of failure; i.e.: “If we don’t grow enough potatoes, we’ll be hungry.” Rather, help your children to understand the positive, real-life effects of gardening: “This year we are growing our own pumpkins to carve for Halloween!”
Nature will fix our most of our mistakes, anyhow.
In addition to providing an opportunity to express themselves in an altruistic way, most tasks in the garden can be related to school subjects. Use this opportunity to introduce words and concepts to your child such as biology, ecosystem, photosynthesis, carbohydrates, osmosis and others. Concepts such as interdependency, food chain, and soil health will be obvious to them, even if they cannot express it verbally. These words may seem advanced, but children learn quickly, especially when they’re doing something with a higher purpose that feels like teamwork and is fun. Soon, they’ll be asking you, “Mom, can we go into the ecosystem today?”
Your child will relate school subjects to tangible, meaningful experiences at home while building a skill that supports the family.
To start this gardening team-building exercise, here are four easy steps:
1. Determine the garden tasks that need to be completed (any time of year).
2. Determine which of these tasks your child can do by himself/herself.
3. Determine which of these tasks he/she needs assistance with, but can still participate in.
4. Determine which of these tasks are best suited for adults.
Once you have this list, allow your child to decide how the tasks will get done. They will need help setting deadlines. Trust their eagerness and excitement if something resonates with them. The job they are excited about is the job that they will complete without needing to remind them. Giving each task a mission name can make it more fun, such as “Operation: Grow Worms.” This helps them understand the overall goal of the task (i.e., attract worms to the garden), and will also make it fun.
Finally, once harvest time arrives and the pumpkins are carved or baked into a pie, be sure to acknowledge the hard work your child has done to put food on the table. This can be one of the most rewarding feelings in the world, and is one of the biggest reasons why adults find motivation in their occupation. Taking care of others is why we are all here. Children have the capacity to take care of others, and gardening is a great way to allow them this opportunity.