Gardening in School

[Cloud]

When I was at school we had Rural Science which taught us all about growing things ect,we even kept bees and had an ant farm.
It seems nowadays there is no such lesson and there seems to be a big emphasais on IT.

[supergrass]

I am sure that is the case in most schools. though after a numbers i thought it would be a good idea if i could get some help with my gardening so i asked at the local school would they like the kids to learn about gardening and got a great response from the principal it was not long before i had the kids doing a lot of work for me which of course was free plus it was helping them.

Max.

[Tori]

I'm a teacher of a Reception class ( 4 and 5 year olds). We have a vegetable garden in pots! The children water, plant out and look after the vegetables and all the flowers everyday. It is a big part of our teaching, the kids love it.

[rogesse]

It seems now to rely on an enterprising teacher, parent or TA. I regularly hand over stuff to my son's old primary because one of their TA's is an allotment neighbour and gives her spare time to garden with the kids, most of which in this area live in flats. This certainly didn't happen when my son was there as the headmistress wasn't keen (health and safety nut).

Most science was rural when I was growing up (Northumberland) but I don't remember a dedicated lesson - I'd have loved the chance to look after bees, all I got was the class gerbil

[areia]

did you ever do the kent county show cloud
i did rural science at school loved it, my sons school has gardening club once a week, ive seen there patch but its not watered during the rest of the week the bedding plants look so poorly, the tomatoes are looking good but then toms grow pretty much anywhere gonna mentioned tomorrow about it, i have made sure my some knows his carrots from his tommies chicldren should learn more and get off the computers surely not everychild can end up in jobs solely using a computer

[lynda66]

hmmmmmm now theres a thought, get an allotment, and invite all the schools in the area to bring a class down for a day ........ get it all dug for free, and i just get to do the good bit of planting seeds

[zazen999]

did you ever do the kent county show cloud

I did!!! Detling Hill.
Nightmare - steam engines and cows everywhere. And you were inundated with brochures for absolutely nothing relevant.

I now never go to county shows just in case.

[Two_Sheds]

Schools don't concentrate so much on spelling, either. Hence, a lot of written English nowadays is hard to understand. However, this is true in the older generation as well.

Our school has a veg patch, but realistically there isn't the time to tend it properly. You know how long it takes to do your allotment? Well, consider doing that and a full time job herding 25 children around.

[zazen999]

It doesn't help the schools either that the main harvesting and weeding season is in the holidays.

[squashysu]

i am just setting the school i work in as an Eco School, they are 3-4 years, also we are growing things and trying to grow more next year, as i am fed up with the lack of recycling etc.....so guess who got the job.

Also, my kids school is at the back of my school and myself and a friend have planted, with the kids, 4 raised beds full of veg, lets hope it gets looked after at breaktimes, they are between 4-10 years old.....

i know what you mean though, i will educate my kids on growing themselves, i think they are impressed so far, well they are with the straws!!!!

SS

[Flummery]

We did 'gardening in primary school. (Back in the middle of the last century!) It was only when I got older I realised they were using the 10/11 year olds to keep the garden srubberies tidy, trimmed and hoed! Blimmin' cheek!

[Mikey]

Rural science was a class in our secondary school, but unless you were in the lowest set, you had no option to do it. I think their reasoning behind it was the likelihood that these kids needed valuable manual skills to get them by in the real world. I'd have loved to have grown things in school, meanies. Oh Siani Blewog, teaches graphics, woodwork, engineering, and metalwork, but she says there is little practical work undertaken these days as there simply isn't the funding. They have all the hitech cam machines going(donated by local business) but no one gets to plane a bit of wood anymore. Her capitation per pupil for the year is just over £1!!!!!, £1 for all teaching materials for a year, this worlds gone mad. If it wasn't for the generousity of companies in the community, they would have no materials at all.

[Flummery]

I never knew much Welsh Mikey, but isn't Siani Blewog a hairy caterpillar? Or did I dream that?
Strewth I have some odd dreams - must give up the cheese suppers!

[di]

daisy's school have lots of pots outside each classroom & also regularly go to the allotment nearby,another local primary school have a plot on our lottie site,but as zazen99 pointed out most of the harvesting is done in the summer holidays!
like Mikey I also remember in high school rural science only being an option for the "lower set",I guess the rest of us were supposed to get out in the real world get ourselves a high paying job & be able to afford to pay someone else to grow our veg!not having any links with high school now I dont know what they do/dont do?

[Pootle]

We had Rural Studies too! OH thinks that I'm mad when I talk about it - but everyone had to do it up to 3rd year and then it was really a subject for the less able who were probably destined for work on the land (I'm only 37 by the way, so it wasn't quite the dark ages!) Although there was Farm Club outside of the school day.

We learned about preparing the soil, planting etc as well as tending to the school farm - sheep, goats and pigs. We also had 2 Jersey cows which used to jump gates and make a run for it every so often. We had to lobby the EEC to get a milk quota for them! The best bit though was that the sheep used to graze on our best hockey pitch, those of us in the team would spend days before a big match piling up the droppings at strategic points on the edges of the pitch to stymie the other team...happy days.