Lessons in the garden

We started our herb garden this past week, along with some new flowers. The girls were excited to get dirty, but reluctant to hear my "life cycle, photosynthesis, importance in composting, parts of a plant" speech. As Mya pointed out: I like the planting, but not all this learning. (I am so looking forward to parent-teacher conferences in kindergarten.)

I told them to just put the garden together and since they know EVERYTHING, there is no need for me to say anything about gardening at all. I suggested they sort the plants before we got started.  They chose to sort by edible vs. non edible, then sorted each group further by expected height.  Marlee thought it was a good idea to place the plants while in their containers around the plot to see where we may want to put them in the ground.  We discussed height, sun/shade requirements, appearance, and accessibility to our herbs.

After everything was planned out, we had a great time creating our garden.  Both girls were relieved that they escaped my science lesson. I couldn't bear to tell them all that sorting, spatial reasoning, and critical thinking was certainly a killer math lesson that I could not have better planned myself!