Hopefully, nobody lost sleep over the threat of frost this weekend!  Saturday’s snow was a harmless,  wet snow that didn’t accumulate too much.

If you haven’t planted your garden, be sure to get planting this week to ensure a harvest or two before school’s out for the summer.

Read these tips to help you get organized and lead a successful Schoolyard Garden planting.

Keep the number of students planting between 15-25 students.  Placing 5-10 students on each side of the bed, have them remove any old plant debris left over from the fall. Then, turn the soil with garden tools to prepare the soil for seeds and plants.

Watch our SYG YouTube tutorial on how to prepare your garden for planting here:

Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more helpful Schoolyard Garden tutorials!

Planting Seeds

For Pre-K Gardeners:

Planting seeds in lines is great practice for fine motor skills. Because of the extra time it might take to keep seeds in the lines with appropriate space, it’s wise to draw the lines in the garden beforehand to save time.

Have an equal number of students stand on both sides of the garden.  With two fingers, direct the partners to meet in the middle, pulling back a line no more than ½ inch deep.

3^rd grade and up:

Have an equal number of students stand on both sides of the garden.  With two fingers, direct the partners to meet in the middle, pulling back a line no more than ½ inch deep.

Reference your seed envelope and encourage students to place a seed one at a time with enough space.

Helpful tip: use one hand width for row spacing, keeping in mind that sugar snap peas will need two hand’s width of space between each row.

Vegetable Transplants-

For PreK- 2^nd grade students:

Before students come out to the garden, make holes where you want the plants to be planted.

Have students take turns “tickling” or loosening the roots before placing the transplant in the hole.

For 3^rd grade and up:

Plan and draw out a map of the garden using paper, sidewalk chalk, or a white board.  After dividing students into groups, assign each group to plant a vegetable or garden bed.

The Schoolyard Garden program now supports 220 schools and we want to thank all our teachers and volunteers that get out there and plant.

If you’re still learning, and need assistance planting your garden this season, your Schoolyard Garden coordinator is available until April 5.

Happy Planting!