Lesson Idea | Planting in the Garden

Goals

Students choose what to grow, how to grow it, and when to plant a fall garden.

Curriculum Alignment

Find a list of which Common Core State Standards and NC Essential Standards this lesson plan aligns with on Growing Minds website.

Materials

- Fall seeds (with seed packets that have planting/spacing directions on them) or plant starts (with plant tags that have planting/spacing directions on them)
- Wood craft sticks cut to 1 inch in length
- Trowels
- Watering cans
- Fall vegetables to taste (optional)

Activities

Vegetable Selection
Come up with a list of fall vegetable planting options – depending on your region beets, carrots, radishes, lettuce, spinach, turnips, and onions may be good choices. Have a vote on which fall vegetables the students want to grow. Discuss how each vegetable prefers to grow at a certain time of year. Which vegetables can grow in cool weather? If you have frost and freezes in your area, which vegetables can grow in those conditions? When purchasing your seeds or plant starts, take note of the suggested seed spacing on the seed packets or plant tags so that you can plan how many seeds or plant starts to purchase and plant in your garden space. While planting seeds is a more economical choice, plant starts offer instant gratification in planting and will allow you to harvest sooner. You can plant a combination of seed and plant starts.

Taste Test Planting Options

It can be helpful (and fun!) to taste test vegetables so students can choose which ones they want to plant.

Plan and Map the Vegetable Planting

Draw a bird’s-eye-view of the garden bed on a whiteboard or large piece of paper and guide the students in mapping out the location of the vegetables. As you go through each vegetable, explain how that vegetable grows – does it climb? Does it grow underground? Do we eat its root? Its leaves? Show the students examples of the seeds or plant starts you are going to plant. Do they want to plant in rows or create a design with the plants?

For further information, please visit Growing Minds website.