Let's Go on a Scavenger Hunt!

Upon visiting the garden this week, we noticed that our garden beds were covered in a luscious forest of greenery. After weeks of hot and dry weather, lots of garden maintenance was required in order to ensure the ultimate well-being of our beloved Kids Grow garden plot. We started with some pruning of our spinach as they had all gone to flower. Did you know that spinach plants are more likely to bolt in hot weather? It is a self defence mechanism to make sure that if all the leaves dry up, the flowers will produce enough pollen to grow a new plant if necessary. If we let the plants go to flower, all of the plant's energy goes into producing the flowers and in turn, the leaves grow small and taste quite bitter. We snipped off the flowers to make sure all of the plant's energy is making it's way to the producing large, dark green and tasty leaves. The kids took turns to water the garden and also lent a helping hand by watering any of the plots in the community garden that belonged to vacationers or those unable to come out to the garden and water on a regular basis. After all, it is a community garden and we want to make sure we can do everything we can to help out our fellow community garden members! We lovingly watered these plants with great care as to be careful not to get too much water on the leaves. It water sits on the leaves in the hot sun, they can be singed and in very wet conditions, mould has a more suitable environment to grow. 

Following our gardening segment, we decided to read a story, in fact a guessing game, about plant identification! This was in preparation for our scavenger hunt in which the children and their families were asked to search the garden for various greens, veggies, flowers and berries! For some extra excitement, we also asked the kids to retrieve scattered puzzle pieces around the garden/orchard to build our mystery puzzle in conclusion of the day's adventure. A lot about plant growth was learned at this event, especially when our participants had trouble finding potatoes and beets in the garden! We also asked families to find some fun artifacts such as a crazy hamster (picture found below), a ken doll doing the splits and a pig wearing earrings. The kids searched high and low, far and near for all of the items on the list and were able to find almost everything. We also had them on a hunt for nature's creatures; a worm, a beetle and an ant. We had to pur our thinking caps on to find these creatures, as they aren't always visible to us wherever we look. After checking under rocks for beetles, digging in the ground for worms and peeking into cracks on the sidewalk for ants, we were successful in finding all the items on our list!

Since we've had some picky eaters at Kids Grow, especially in the department of vegetables, one of our awesome team members created rainbow cards for each child that pose the following question: Can you taste the colours of the rainbow this summer? The purpose of these cards is to encourage trying new vegetables in the garden and embracing new looks, flavours and textures. This week, we shared a snack of mini cucumbers and French Breakfast radishes. The kids were able to add fresh raspberries from the communal plot. Our day ended some exciting games of 'Fruit Salad' and 'Capture the Crops' and of course our weekly sharing circle to share our favourite part of the day!

You don't have to be an plant expert or hiking enthusiast to take a nature walk. Go on a hunt outdoors, spend some time in the sun and make time to appreciate the wonderful creations of nature that surround you. 

Snug as a Bug

On Saturday August 8th, we arrived at our garden to find that it was hit relatively hard by the hail storm earlier in the week. Thank goodness we harvested some of our veggies last week! The kids helped us by turning over the soil that had been flatted by the harsh weather. Although this turned mostly into looking for worms, the soil in our garden received the love that it needed.

After a few minutes of turning soil and finding worms, the kids met Judy Marsh from Outdoors In to learn all about bugs. Judy's philosophy is all about learning to care for the environment through experiential learning ie. hands on learning. The first thing she had the kids do was find all the parts of an insect that she hid around the orchard. When the kids brought all the pieces back, they assembled the mystery bug. It was a dragonfly! We learned all about how wonderful dragonflies are for the environment.

Judy also played several games with the kids including 'The Bat and the Moth,' which had a child blindfolded in the circle trying to find another child who was ringing a bell. This game emulated the way a bat uses its superb hearing to look for food at night. She also played a game which had the kids running a relay race as bumble bees getting pollen (tennis balls) from the other side of the park. The children (and adults) had so much fun playing bug games with Judy that they didn't even notice how much they were learning. The time we spent with Judy this morning was awesome.

After all the fun games, our little bugs worked up an appetite and met Laurie on the blanket for a snack and a story. Today's story was about caterpillars, another one of our favourite bugs!

We had so much fun today. We can't wait to see what next Saturday brings.

How Do Plants Grow?

This week's activities centred on exploring the plant life cycle. After some very productive work weeding, watering and tasting some delicious edibles from the garden, the kids headed over to the orchard to get started on our first activity of the day.

They were quite adept at piecing together the whole narrative from the seed to the plant which flowers before finally bearing the fruit containing the seeds to start it all over again. It’s definitely a process that we overlook too often, yet it never ceases to amaze us when we contemplate how all the potentialities of a plant are contained in the seed – life’s original ‘miracle,’ that sustains all other life on this planet!

We also read a little story together that visualized this idea beautifully by illustrating the diversity of flowers and fruits carried on this Earth (who doesn’t love children’s books?!) and the kids were definitely recognizing a lot of the plants! The kids harnessed their artistic talents in composing some really creative pictures that incorporated actual plant-material with colourful additions of their own which all melded nicely together on the page, I have to say! 

Naturally, we finished off with a game full of laughter and fun, 'Capture the Crops'. It was a wonderful way to  enjoy the beautiful weather, get some exercise and end our wonderful day.