Summer is the lushest time of the year for the garden, but it also happens to be when most schools are on break. Even if your school is not in session during the summer months, that doesn’t mean your students have to miss out on garden favorites like tomatoes and peppers! Sweet potatoes are low-maintenance […]
KC Healthy Kids to Offer Free Training for Teachers
\Each year, schools and students around Kansas City participate in KC Healthy Kids’ annual ‘I Am Here’ Youth Advocacy photo contest. The contest encourages students to examine the health, or lack of health, in their own communities and to document their findings in photos. This contest is a great lesson where students learn the importance […]
Preschool Students Plant Their Spring Vegetable Gardens
Students at Richardson Early Learning Center were so excited to get out planting in their garden! They planted mustard greens, Sugar Ann snap peas and carrot seeds. While planting our garden, we talked about keeping track of our seeds by planting them in a straight line. We also talked with them about how it’s important to […]
Rain, Rain, Go Away
If you’ve looked outside in the last 10 days chances are you’ve only seen grey skies or rain. It was a wet end to March and beginning of April. It’s rained nearly every day of the last two weeks. If you’ve already planted your spring garden you are likely welcoming in the rain. If your […]
How to Use Row Cover to Speed Up Your Schoolyard Garden Veggies
Despite the unpredictable temperatures of the midwest, and the short school calendar, your students could be eating broccoli, cabbage, collards and kale from their schoolyard garden before the end of the school year! But how? Row cover is a friend to the schoolyard garden. It not only insulates your veggies when temperatures drop, but it also keeps […]
Snacks from the Schoolyard Garden – The Best Part of Growing Your Own Food!
The most exciting part of growing vegetables is getting to eat all the yummy veggies. While the Schoolyard Gardens team is partial to eating veggies straight from the garden, it’s fun to try them in a few inventive ways as well. Below are a few of our favorite kid-friendly recipes. All of these recipes require little […]
Why Schoolyard Gardens Need Winter
In the dead of winter, the cold can seem endless for teachers and students alike. Those warm, sunny days, like what we’ll experience this week, are often treasured during the bleak months of January and February, but as gardeners, we should be thankful for the cold, icy and snowy days that the winter brings! But […]
This Winter, Make Garden Signs with Your Students to Prepare for the Growing Season!
Have you ever had trouble identifying plants in your garden, or forgotten what you planted in a bed? Plant markers help students and adults alike with vegetable identification. Rather than using the small plastic markers that can fall out or wash off, consider making larger, more permanent signs to make your schoolyard garden more informative […]
Burke Elementary Schoolyard Garden Growing Strong for Seven Years
The vegetable garden at Burke Elementary in the Hickman Mills school district has continued to thrive over the last seven years thanks to the continued dedication of one teacher—Swapnam Kumar. Swapnam is a teacher for 4th grade English language learners. She is passionate about gardening and has partnered with KCCG since 2009, when the students […]
Sumner Academy Vegetable Garden Thrives Under Student Direction
The students in garden club at Sumner Academy of Arts and Sciences are a committed bunch. They have been single-handedly maintaining their four vegetable beds, their raspberry bed and their asparagus bed. The students come out regularly to water and harvest from their garden–this fall, they were harvesting their summer crops (tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers) […]