School Gardens: choosing what to grow, Vegetables or herbs
you can start them at any time of the year.
• Harvest a crop indoors – If you don’t have an outdoor growing space but would still like to give students the opportunity to taste some vegetables they’ve grown themselves, choose quick maturing crops that can be grown under plant lights or on a sunny windowsill. Some good choices include radishes, lettuce, basil, spinach and kale. You can plant these crops at any time since they will spend their lives indoors.
• Grow transplants for the outdoor garden – If you have an outdoor school garden (either inground or container), you can start seeds of some plants early indoors and then transplant the young plants to the garden when the weather conditions are appropriate. Or perhaps you want to grow plants that students can take home and plant in their own outdoor gardens.
Good crops to start early indoors are those that need a long time to reach their harvesting stage and which tolerate the transplanting process well. These include tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, broccoli, kale, cabbage, onions and parsley. This early start gives you an earlier harvest.
Some faster-growing plants such as lettuce and basil can be started early indoors and transplanted, and/or the seeds can be sown later directly out in the garden.
Starting Seeds Outdoors Some plants don’t tolerate transplanting well and their seeds are usually sown directly in the garden where they will grow. These include root crops like beets and carrots, beans, peas and corn.
Melons, cucumbers, and squash resent transplanting and usually grow best when direct sown. But they can be started early indoors if they are grown in individual plantable (biodegradable) pots so their roots are not disturbed when they’re transplanted.
Fitting Gardening into the School Calendar
Gardening in a school setting, both indoors and outside, presents some special challenges. Keeping these considerations in mind from the start will help to make your gardening projects a success.
When you’re growing plants indoors in a classroom, it’s important to have a plan in place to care for plants over school breaks. Young seedlings, especially, need frequent watering; so if there is a break that’s longer than a weekend, make arrangements for someone to check on and care for your baby plants.
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