It’s warm outside. The sun is shining bright and white cumulus clouds drift in the blue skies. You notice your students’ eyes wandering outside as you are trying to find ways to keep their’ minds engaged in their science class. You are desperately wishing that you could take your students out of doors while also teaching content related to the National Science Education Standards.

Good news! Outdoor projects such as planting and maintaining a garden satisfy all aspects of scientific inquiry by inviting interactive and hands-on exploration. By creating a garden, students will be able to look at how energy moves throughout an ecosystem. Furthermore, such an activity fosters students’ ability to conduct original research by coming up with their own ways to collect data on a wide range of questions. Outdoor projects also allow students to make observations that are both qualitative and quantitative.

In 2009, Michelle Obama and Washington-area school kids planted the White House vegetable garden. Watch a video of First Lady Obama touring the organic vegetable garden and discussing her goal of educating children about healthy eating. Then read the accompanying article by Dan Shapley with your students. Seeing our government take action will help students to see the importance of their own school garden project. You can see more coverage of the White House garden on a Washington City Paper blog, which was recorded on April 8, 2010.

Connecting to Standards

Outdoor projects, such as planting and maintaining an organic garden, align with the following content standards for grades 5-8 from the National Science Education Standards.

Content Standard C: Life Science

Regulation and Behavior

-All organisms must be able to obtain and use resources, grow, reproduce, and maintain stable internal conditions while living in a constantly changing external environment.

Populations and Ecosystems

-For ecosystems, the major source of energy is sunlight. Energy entering ecosystems as sunlight is transferred by producers into chemical energy through photosynthesis. That energy then passes from organism to organism in food webs.

Background Information

What is organic gardening?

Organic gardening does not use synthetic fertilizers or pesticides. Organic gardeners choose plants that are suitable to their specific climate and environmental conditions. It is also important to consider the soil, water supply, wildlife, insects, and even people. Organic gardeners try to minimize any resources the garden consumes, replenishing resources with organic matter.

Why should we garden organically?

When you grow vegetables organically, you are not only eating healthier but also creating a sustainable and more balanced ecosystem. Furthermore, obtaining produce from your own garden is often cheaper than buying it from a grocery store.

Organicgardening.com is an online resource that will answer many questions about organic gardening.

Learning Objectives

Creating an organic classroom garden can be a year-long endeavor, which encourages you to go outdoors with your students. By the end of the gardening project, your students will have:

-An understanding of how organisms may interact with one another.

-An understanding of how changes in an organism’s ecosystem/habitat affect its survival.

-An understanding of how an organism can only survive if its needs are met (e.g., food, water, shelter, air).

-An understanding of how all organisms cause changes in their ecosystem and how these changes can be beneficial, neutral, or detrimental.

-An understanding of food chains and food webs (e.g., producers, herbivores, carnivores, omnivores and decomposers).

-An understanding of how natural occurrences and human activity affect the transfer of energy in an ecosystem.

-An understanding of how the number of organisms an ecosystem can support depends on adequate biotic resources and abiotic resources.

-An understanding of how organisms or populations may interact with one another through symbiotic relationships and how some species have become so adapted to each other that neither could survive without the other.

Activity

To get your students thinking about organic gardening and the components that it entails, have students come up with a design for a garden. This can be done online, bringing technology into the classroom. KiddoNet offers an online planner that allows students to design a flower garden. If computers are not available, the activity can be done using an 8.5″ by 11″ sheet of copy paper and crayons.

When students have completed their garden design, ask them to explain it in a think-aloud fashion. Use the following questions as a guide. (If students need help researching, you may want to give students the questions before they come up with their designs.)

- How big will your garden be? Why?

- Will it be located in a sunny or shady environment?

- Is the area warm or cool?

- How much rainfall does the area get?

- Is the area close to water sources? If not, what arrangements will be needed to ensure that the garden survives?

- What is the soil like?

- Is the location hilly or flat?

- How many plants do you plan to have in your garden?

- How many types of plants do you plan on having?

- What should you consider when choosing your plants?

- Are animals allowed to enter the garden?

- If so, what types? Are they important in the survival of the garden?

- Is there any symbiosis or mutualism occurring in the garden?

- What energy cycles do you expect to occur?

- What biotic resources are important to your garden?

- What are the relationships between the abiotic and biotic parts of your garden?

- How could you maximize diversity?

- How would increased diversity lead to an increased energy transfer throughout the garden?

- How would the presence of humans and pets affect the energy within the garden?

The type of garden or outdoor project that you actually engage your students in depends on the age of the students, financial means, and time constraints. You may want to consider applying for grants to finance an organic garden project. You can find a list of grant opportunities at the Middle School Portal/Getting Grants page.

Additional Information

Middle School Portal 2 has many resources about gardening. Try Thinking Green? Grow Your Own! Linking Agriculture, Gardening and Technology. This resource guide provides ideas and resources for integrating science and technology into studies of agriculture and gardening. It provides answers to these questions: What, and how, can students learn from gardening? How can gardening be accomplished in urban or suburban sites? What technologies enable agriculture and home gardening? What are the underlying science principles of these technologies? What is the economic impact of agriculture and home gardening? Some related careers are also highlighted.