Want to get children gardening? Here's how
Experts give their tips on how to give kids green fingers
My eldest, Rowan, is distinctly unimpressed when I tell him I am going to turn him into a gardener. “But I don’t want to be a gardener, I want to be an engineer,” he protests, and gives me the side eye when I tell him that he can be both, honestly – lots of people are.
I know that gardening is something kids should do. Getting their hands dirty and watching seeds germinate helps them develop a love of the outside world and a solid set of wisteria pruning skills. I garden and I have kids – Meg is seven and Rowan is nearly 10 – but I have only ever made the vaguest of attempts to garden with them. They spend a lot of time on the allotment but they generally just climb trees and… Actually I don’t even know what they do: as long as they are having fun, I tend to keep out of it. They have barely sown a seed, and on the odd occasion that they have dabbled, their interest has not lasted through to germination, let alone harvest. Where have I been going wrong?
I asked four experts whether I should mend my ways, and how. Dawn Isaac has three children of her own and has written several books on gardening with children. She says: “It’s almost impossible to think of a reason children should not start gardening. It is educational, humbling, exciting – it makes them part of nature, rather than an observer of it, and it helps them to comprehend that we are only part of a much larger ecosystem that we have to nurture and protect.”
Blue Peter gardeners Dale and Lee Connelly (known as the Skinny Jean Gardeners) agree. “There’s something magical about gardening, and kids get that. They get that it’s totally awesome to see an incy wincy seed turn into something you can eat.”
Clearly these are all things I want for my children: I must try harder. But author Tom Moggach, who runs a garden project at Rhyl primary school in north London, feels my pain: “Frankly, gardening with young children can – at times – be exasperating. We may imagine gentle hours pootling together on the plot. But the reality is quite different. Their tiny attention spans can sabotage any peace and progress.”
And this is part of my trouble: gardening has always been “mine” and I cling to it territorially. It was my hobby before they were born and it is my hobby now, and the few moments I get between cuddling, providing snacks and refereeing, I like to spend wandering, cup of tea in one hand and trowel in the other, rather than cajoling them into improving themselves. Shame on me. I decided to ask my experts to give me a few tasks to try to mend my kids’ non-gardening ways.
All my experts agree that a space of their own is crucial, so we start off with a couple of pots. Isaac suggests letting them decorate them. Meg in particular is very up for this. In fact, I think she would do the decorating all day long if I didn’t steer her towards planting something up. Isaac suggests a garden centre trip to let them pick out their own plants, but I remember a pot of seedlings Meg sowed at Brownies and begged me to plant out a few weeks ago. It dawns on me that she has shown an interest in gardening and I have ignored it. So we whip out the seedlings and I show her how to tease the root ball apart – to squawks of indignation – and pot them up. She waters thoroughly, and looks proud: the makings of a gardener.
Rowan chooses a cucumber from the greenhouse, pots it up carefully, but entirely forgets to water it. His mind is clearly on gears and cogs. He comes into his own during the next task: mud pies. This was suggested by Moggach, as he encourages his own daughter to get used to being mucky. And, yes, mine would wallow in the mud all day. I tell them they can pick whatever they like to decorate their pies and Meg tops hers with daisies and grass. Rowan heads for the borders and I find myself wincing: “Oh, yes, well… not those flowers perhaps?” It becomes crystal clear that I – tense and overprotective of my garden – am the problem. I have seen glimpses of the latent gardener in each of my children, and I reckon he or she may well emerge if I act on their flashes of interest. But above all I just need to learn to share, nicely.
How to garden with kids: tips from the experts
Dawn Isaac, author of Garden Crafts For Children and 101 Things For Kids To Do OutsideEncourage them to be budding entrepreneurs: they could dry herbs and make scented bags with them, or grow and sell their own cut flowers.
Weird stuff always goes down well. Steer them towards edible flowers, or unusually coloured or shaped veg.
Let some of their crops run to seed, so that they can collect seeds, design seed packets and then give them to friends and family as gifts – or just keep them for next year.
Tom Moggach, author of The Urban Kitchen Gardener
Pounce on any flashes of interest. Cast off adult preconceptions and think about how you can transform that tentative spark of interest into an activity they can sustain for more than a few nanoseconds.
Graze from the plot – show them how easy it is to pick a pea or eat a nasturtium flower. Greed is always a good motivator.
Watering is another winner. Punch little holes in the lids of large recycled mineral water bottles to produce a light sprinkle of water, so they can fill them up and wander around the garden.
Dale and Lee Connelly, the Skinny Jean Gardeners
Try growing upside-down, hanging-basket tomato plants. Cut the bottom off a 1.5l bottle and punch four holes around the cut edge. Feed a tomato seedling into the cut end and carefully pull the leaves through the spout, so the leaves are outside and the roots inside. Fill the bottle with compost to hold the roots in place and thread twine through the holes. Then hang it somewhere in the sun, water it regularly and wait for the tomatoes to grow.
Let children get muddy. Put them in old clothes and relax. They have so few opportunities in life to get properly grubby and they love it.
Go on a worm hunt. Teach them the importance of worms and show them how to handle them carefully.
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