ENABLING ENVIRONMENTS COLLECTIONS Dig...
1
FURTHER INFORMATION Here are some useful gardening resources with all the information that’s needed on what to grow, how to grow it and what to do when it’s been harvested: l Growing Schools, a DfS initiative: www. growingschools. org.uk l The RHS campaign for school gardening: www.rhs.org.uk/ schoolgardening l The Council for Learning Outside the Classroom: www. lotc.org.uk SUPPLIERS lwww.burgonandball. com l Cosy, tel: 01332 370152 l www.playgardens. co.uk l www.norseman direct.com l www.spearand jackson-online.co.uk l www.spottygreen frog.co.uk l www.tts-group.co.uk l www.waterbutts direct.co.uk l www.wigglywigglers. co.uk WWW.NURSERYWORLD.CO.UK WWW.NURSERYWORLD.CO.UK 16-29 APRIL 2012 NURSERY WORLD 19 use, she advises, ‘Design long thin ones that are narrow enough for children to reach across them from either side without walking on them. Or provide small square ones that are accessible all around so children don’t need to walk over the earth.’ Here are some ideas for your plant- ing and growing collection: l Use free-standing planters that are the right height for children. Try the attractive wooden Nursery Boxes, from £165, or the Mini Garden Boxes, £39, from www. norsemandirect.com. The Junior Veg Table, £110, has been adapted to cater for children aged 3+ and the Blackboard Raised Planter (pictured left), £50, comes in different heights and allows children to decorate with chalk, both from Cosy. l If you can’t afford planters, stack up tyres and fill them with soil and compost. But think about what surface it will go on and where the water will drain to. l Create raised beds to grow vegetables such as potatoes, onions and carrots, with slats of wood or use the Link-a-Bord Raised Bed, from £20.20 for a 1 x 1m Kit, from www.wigglywigglers.co.uk. Alternatively, there’s Cosy’s Mini Grow Bed, £17.95, which is perfect for settings with little space. l Provide opportunities for children to transport water to the planted area. If a setting has a water butt with a tap, children can learn to fill up watering cans and take them to plants that need watering. Try the 100-litre Slim Rainstore Waterbutt, £20.97, from www. waterbuttsdirect.co.uk. Ensure it has a stand and a lid for safety. l Creating compost is a valuable asset to gardening as it enriches the soil and gives children an awareness of the food cycle. Available are the CompostBox, £69, from www.wigglywigglers. co.uk, the Odour Free Compost Caddy, a nine-litre model ideal for indoor use, £9.50, or the Composter and Wormery, £28.95, from Cosy. n full-sized can, so children get a full-body physical experience when transporting water to the beds. l Give children the opportunity to transport materials around the garden in a child-sized wheelbarrow. Try the metal Wheelbarrow, £40, from www. playgardens.co.uk; the wooden Children’s Wheelbarrow, £29.95 from Cosy or Cosy’s Folding Wheelbarrow (pictured below), £13.95. For younger children who may not have the skill to manoeuvre a wheelbarrow with one wheel, try the Two Wheel Barrow pictured below right), £29.95, from Cosy. l For starter sets of gardening tools and equipment, there’s the Standard Gardening Resource Box, £50, from www.playgardens. co.uk, which includes five sets of mini hand forks, trowels and rakes, two watering cans and two buckets. Or the Gardening Equipment for Nursery Schools, £52, which includes three watering cans, three hand forks and trowels and six pairs of gloves, from www. spottygreenfrog.co.uk. ORGANISING YOUR SPACE Gail Ryder-Richardson advises posi- tioning a garden where it will have access to water and sun, while sepa- rating it from other types of digging so children can distinguish between digging for the sake of digging and digging for gardening. She adds, ‘If space is tight, planters can double as zoning areas by subdividing the space.’ When deciding what type of planters or raised beds to and water, check out the Outdoor Brush Set, a pack of four brushes, £16.99, from www.tts-group. co.uk or the Real Life Child’s Brush, £9.95 for a set of four from Cosy on 01332 370152. Or for a collaborative approach try the Giant Two Handled Brush (pictured right), £9.95, from Cosy. l Rakes can be used to cultivate the surface of the soil or to clear leaves and grass from a lawn. The Children’s Lawn Rake, £14.50, and the Children’s Soil Rake, £14.40, are available from Cosy. A Safe Plastic Leaf Rake, £6, can also be bought from Cosy. Or the Individual Garden Rake, £2.95, is one of a range of child-sized garden tools from www.tts-group.co.uk. l Provide a range of watering cans with at least two small versions, like the Child Watering Can, £4.50 from Cosy or the five-litre Red Watering Can, £5.50, from www. spottygreenfrog.co.uk, and one ENABLING ENVIRONMENTS COLLECTIONS 18 NURSERY WORLD 16-29 APRIL 2012 Dig deep Gardening helps children’s development and brings them closer to nature, so having the right tools is essential, says Nicole Weinstein G ardening provides end- less opportunities for children of all ages to get physically active and close to nature. Practi- tioners do not need to be expert gardeners. All that’s needed is a little enthusiasm and the right tools for the job - to help children dig, plant, water and sow seeds. Settings may also want to offer resources like water butts or compost bins that will extend the opportunities children have for gardening and learning. Julie Mountain, outdoor learning and play consultant and director of Play Learning Life, says that there are ‘plenty’ of reasons to do garden- ing with children over and above the desire to have a vegetable garden. She explains, ‘The gardening is of less interest to children than the digging and reaping, the sowing and watch- ing things grow. Some reasons to do it are for new language development, collaboration, physical development and hand-eye co-ordination, which will help with mark-making later on.’ CORE PRODUCTS Resources that enable children to get involved in gardening activities should feature in your continuous everyday provision. Sets of child- sized hand tools, including trowels and short-handled gardening forks and child-sized long-handled tools for digging, raking and sweeping are essential, along with watering cans and wheelbarrows. Julie Mountain advises settings to invest in good-quality scaled-down versions of adult tools. She says, ‘Digging is a really important activ- ity, particularly for younger children. If they are trying to dig a hole in wet sand or soil they need a proper tool that will not bend or break.’ The number of tools needed will depend on how a setting organises its gardening activities. For exam- ple, those with a free-flow philoso- phy may have patches of dirt or growing areas children can access freely. In this case it’s a good idea to have a trug, a flexible plastic tub filled with the two or three pieces of equipment of each kind so a number of children can dig collaboratively. Gail Ryder Richardson, early years training and consultant and director of Outdoor Matters, recommends tak- ing children to a garden centre when choosing tools, to give them the con- text of what gardening is all about as well as to try out the tools. She explains, ‘Rather than the makeover approach, where the prac- titioner turns up with equipment the children have no idea how to use, this makes the process of creating the gar- den part of the children’s experience.’ Here are some ideas for what to include in your gardening collection: l Provide good-quality, scaled-down versions of adult gardening tools, if your budget allows. Try the Children’s Digging Spade, £19.95, or the hand trowel, £7.95, from www.burgonandball.com. Or, for the hearty diggers, try the Tiny Traditions Children’s Digging Fork, £12.95, and the Trowel & Weed Fork Set, £7.99, from www. spearandjackson-online.co.uk. l For tidying up the garden and sweeping up the leaves, soil, sand Priory Infant School, in Ramsgate, Kent, has an attractive and well-organised gardening area and a class of budding gardeners. The school has used lottery funding to provide a partly glazed shed that offers secure storage for tools and equipment, as well as a sheltered place to germinate seedlings. The garden has been equipped with good- quality essential gardening equipment including child- sized brooms, watering cans, gardening aprons and gloves, trowels, rakes, and kneelers. The water butt and composting facility ensure that the garden is maintained sustainably. Children can access the tools they need independently and there are plenty to go round, so everyone can be weeding at once. The children tend to two raised beds and also look after the whole area by weeding and sweeping paths. Children have supervised access to the recently re-lined pond, which is already brimming with newts and frogspawn. (Case study kindly supplied by www.outdoormatters. co.uk.) CASE STUDY: PRIORY INFANT SCHOOL Children from Priory Infant School tend to the planters and show off the gardening tools they store in the shed funded by the lottery
Transcript of ENABLING ENVIRONMENTS COLLECTIONS Dig...
FURTHER INFORMATION
Here are some useful gardening resources with all the information that’s needed on what to grow, how to grow it and what to do when it’s been harvested:l Growing Schools, a
DfS initiative: www.growingschools.org.uk
l The RHS campaign for school gardening: www.rhs.org.uk/schoolgardening
l The Council for Learning Outside the Classroom: www.lotc.org.uk
SUPPLIERS
l www.burgonandball.com
l Cosy, tel: 01332 370152
l www.playgardens.co.uk
l www.norsemandirect.com
l www.spearandjackson-online.co.uk
l www.spottygreenfrog.co.uk
l www.tts-group.co.uk l www.waterbutts
direct.co.ukl www.wigglywigglers.
co.uk
www.NURSERywORLd.cO.Uk www.NURSERywORLd.cO.Uk 16-29 ApRiL 2012 NURSERy wORLd 19
use, she advises, ‘Design long thin ones that are narrow enough for children to reach across them from either side without walking on them. Or provide small square ones that are accessible all around so children don’t need to walk over the earth.’
Here are some ideas for your plant-ing and growing collection:l Use free-standing planters that
are the right height for children. Try the attractive wooden Nursery Boxes, from £165, or the Mini Garden Boxes, £39, from www.norsemandirect.com. The Junior Veg Table, £110, has been adapted to cater for children aged 3+ and the Blackboard Raised Planter (pictured left), £50, comes in different heights and allows children to decorate with chalk, both from Cosy.
l If you can’t afford planters, stack up tyres and fill them with soil and compost. But think about what surface it will go on and where the water will drain to.
l Create raised beds to grow vegetables such as potatoes, onions and carrots, with slats of wood or use the Link-a-Bord Raised Bed, from £20.20 for a 1 x 1m Kit, from www.wigglywigglers.co.uk. Alternatively, there’s Cosy’s Mini Grow Bed, £17.95, which is perfect for settings with little space.
l Provide opportunities for children to transport water to the planted area. If a setting has a water butt with a tap, children can learn to fill up watering cans and take them to plants that need watering. Try the 100-litre Slim Rainstore Waterbutt, £20.97, from www.waterbuttsdirect.co.uk. Ensure it has a stand and a lid for safety.
l Creating compost is a valuable asset to gardening as it enriches the soil and gives children an awareness of the food cycle. Available are the CompostBox, £69, from www.wigglywigglers.co.uk, the Odour Free Compost Caddy, a nine-litre model ideal for indoor use, £9.50, or the Composter and Wormery, £28.95, from Cosy. n
full-sized can, so children get a full-body physical experience when transporting water to the beds.
l Give children the opportunity to transport materials around the garden in a child-sized wheelbarrow. Try the metal Wheelbarrow, £40, from www.playgardens.co.uk; the wooden Children’s Wheelbarrow, £29.95 from Cosy or Cosy’s Folding Wheelbarrow (pictured below), £13.95. For younger children who may not have the skill to manoeuvre a wheelbarrow with one wheel, try the Two Wheel Barrow pictured below right), £29.95, from Cosy.
l For starter sets of gardening tools and equipment, there’s the Standard Gardening Resource Box, £50, from www.playgardens.co.uk, which includes five sets of mini hand forks, trowels and rakes, two watering cans and two buckets. Or the Gardening Equipment for Nursery Schools, £52, which includes three watering cans, three hand forks and trowels and six pairs of gloves, from www.spottygreenfrog.co.uk.
ORGANISING yOUR SPAcEGail Ryder-Richardson advises posi-tioning a garden where it will have access to water and sun, while sepa-rating it from other types of digging so children can distinguish between digging for the sake of digging and digging for gardening.
She adds, ‘If space is tight, planters can double as zoning areas by subdividing the
space.’When deciding what type
of planters or raised beds to
and water, check out the Outdoor Brush Set, a pack of four brushes, £16.99, from www.tts-group.co.uk or the Real Life Child’s Brush, £9.95 for a set of four from Cosy on 01332 370152. Or for a collaborative approach try the Giant Two Handled Brush (pictured right), £9.95, from Cosy.
l Rakes can be used to cultivate the surface of the soil or to clear leaves and grass from a lawn. The Children’s Lawn Rake, £14.50, and the Children’s Soil Rake, £14.40, are available from Cosy. A Safe Plastic Leaf Rake, £6, can also be bought from Cosy. Or the Individual Garden Rake, £2.95, is one of a range of child-sized garden tools from www.tts-group.co.uk.
l Provide a range of watering cans with at least two small versions, like the Child Watering Can, £4.50 from Cosy or the five-litre Red Watering Can, £5.50, from www.spottygreenfrog.co.uk, and one
ENABLING ENVIRONMENTS COLLECTIONS
18 NURSERy wORLd 16-29 ApRiL 2012
Dig deepGardening helps children’s development and brings them closer to nature, so having the right tools is essential, says Nicole Weinstein
Gardening provides end-less opportunities for children of all ages to get physically active and close to nature. Practi-tioners do not need to be
expert gardeners. All that’s needed is a little enthusiasm and the right tools for the job - to help children dig, plant, water and sow seeds. Settings may also want to offer resources like water butts or compost bins that will extend the opportunities children have for gardening and learning.
Julie Mountain, outdoor learning and play consultant and director of Play Learning Life, says that there are ‘plenty’ of reasons to do garden-ing with children over and above the desire to have a vegetable garden. She explains, ‘The gardening is of less interest to children than the digging and reaping, the sowing and watch-ing things grow. Some reasons to do it are for new language development, collaboration, physical development and hand-eye co-ordination, which will help with mark-making later on.’
cORE PROdUcTS Resources that enable children to get involved in gardening activities should feature in your continuous everyday provision. Sets of child-sized hand tools, including trowels and short-handled gardening forks and child-sized long-handled tools for digging, raking and sweeping are essential, along with watering cans and wheelbarrows.
Julie Mountain advises settings to invest in good-quality scaled-down versions of adult tools. She says, ‘Digging is a really important activ-ity, particularly for younger children. If they are trying to dig a hole in wet sand or soil they need a proper tool that will not bend or break.’
The number of tools needed will depend on how a setting organises its gardening activities. For exam-ple, those with a free-flow philoso-phy may have patches of dirt or
growing areas children can access freely. In this case it’s a good idea to have a trug, a flexible plastic tub filled with the two or three pieces of equipment of each kind so a number of children can dig collaboratively. Gail Ryder Richardson, early years training and consultant and director of Outdoor Matters, recommends tak-ing children to a garden centre when choosing tools, to give them the con-text of what gardening is all about as well as to try out the tools.
She explains, ‘Rather than the makeover approach, where the prac-titioner turns up with equipment the children have no idea how to use, this makes the process of creating the gar-den part of the children’s experience.’
Here are some ideas for what to include in your gardening collection:l Provide good-quality, scaled-down
versions of adult gardening tools, if your budget allows. Try the Children’s Digging Spade, £19.95, or the hand trowel, £7.95, from www.burgonandball.com. Or, for the hearty diggers, try the Tiny Traditions Children’s Digging Fork, £12.95, and the Trowel & Weed Fork Set, £7.99, from www.spearandjackson-online.co.uk.
l For tidying up the garden and sweeping up the leaves, soil, sand
priory infant School, in Ramsgate, Kent, has an attractive and well-organised gardening area and a class of budding gardeners. The school has used lottery funding to provide a partly glazed shed that offers secure storage for tools and equipment, as well as a sheltered place to germinate seedlings.
The garden has been
equipped with good-quality essential gardening equipment including child-sized brooms, watering cans, gardening aprons and gloves, trowels, rakes, and kneelers. The water butt and composting facility ensure that the garden is maintained sustainably. Children can access the tools they need independently and there are plenty to go round, so
everyone can be weeding at once. The children tend to two raised beds and also look after the whole area by weeding and sweeping paths. Children have supervised access to the recently re-lined pond, which is already brimming with newts and frogspawn.
(Case study kindly supplied by www.outdoormatters.co.uk.)
cASE STUdy: PRIORy INFANT ScHOOL
children from Priory Infant School tend to the planters and show off the gardening tools they store in the shed funded by the lottery
