Teachers overwhelmingly view gardens as valuable! Even when teachers can’t find the time to make it out to the garden for classes, they still value the beauty, diversity, and sensory engagement that gardens can offer their students. Community gardens offer unique opportunities to teach youth about:
• Where food comes from;
• Practical math skills;
• Basic business principles;
• The importance of community and stewardship;
• Issues of environmental sustainability;
• Job and life skills;
And, community gardening is a healthy, inexpensive activity for youth that can bring them closer to nature, and allow them to interact with each other in a socially meaningful and physically productive way.
Next Steps: Identifying design principles that school districts can utilize to encourage more teachers to head out into the garden, or to see it as a more valuable asset.
The Future of the School Garden Program:
While designing these programs, Liz has kept an eye to the future. So far she is only working with a handful of schools, but is eager for Wasatch Community Gardens’ curriculum to be more accessible to for any school teacher that would like to implement it. She would also like to see more schools develop onsite gardens and to aid in garden expansion, long-term success planning, and in-depth curriculum integration with other existing school gardens. Liz is excited about the unique role Wasatch Community Gardens can have in the world of school gardening, and she is looking forward to supporting this growing trend!
If you would like to learn more about the WCG School Garden Program or how to start a garden at your school, please contact liz@wasatchgardens.org or 801.359.2658 x 18.