Gardening With Your Kids: Tips to Include Your Kids in Backyard Care
Your kids may have more toys than you ever thought possible growing up. But, no matter how many gizmos your kids have, it’s only natural for them to show more of an interest in what you’re doing instead.
That’s why it’s so important to involve kids in everything that we do, even seemingly tedious tasks such as gardening chores are vital for the growth of your children. Here are a few ways to ignite your child’s curiosity with gardening and get them involved in backyard care.
Get them all the needed supplies
The easiest and best way to make your children feel involved when gardening is to make sure they have all the same gardening supplies that you have. Ideally, you want to get your children their own real equipment rather than buying them plastic tools that don’t work well.
A small watering can that’s painted in bright colors or a mini shovel set would be a great start. Don’t underestimate the value that a simple book and pen can have for your child when it comes to diarizing their gardening adventures and all they’re learning along the way.
Start slowly
It is better to start with smaller projects in the garden and build up as you go along. For instance, you can start by gardening in a smaller pot and take it from there. The minute your children are comfortable with planting in pots, you can move on to planting in small patches in the garden, and so on.
Grow plants in rows of different colors
Nothing gets kids more excited than color and what better way to get them involved in the garden than by planting rows of vibrant plants. You can plant red plants, yellow plants, and then perhaps a row of purple cabbage. This is a great way to use gardening as an instrument to get your child or children to learn more about colors.
Teach them other outdoor responsibilities
Perhaps you have some outdoor furniture that’s getting ruined by all the gardening activity. Carrying heavy tools such as spades around the gardening area, you may end up knocking the sides of your wooden patio furniture. Show your children how you take care of the general outdoor area including outdoor furniture as well. If you have a patio teak sectional for example, be sure to teach your children how to take care of teak furniture so it can last for generations to come.
Plan and Plant
Your kids will love getting involved in all the planning that goes into gardening and they’ll learn about the importance of setting goals in the process. You can plan all sorts of things with them, such as sowing, planting, and harvesting times, as well as setting up a watering timetable, etc.
The Pizza Garden
Gardening is not only about planting seeds in the ground but also entails the slow cooking process where you cook the fruits of your hard work. Make gardening fun by planting according to what you and your family love. If you love pizza, plant sections of the garden into the shape of slices of pizza. Grow ingredients that you could use on your pizza within these slices. Sounds like quite the treat, doesn’t it?
Weather Watcher
The act of planting a garden is interlinked with many other aspects of life such as watching the weather on the news. In fact, watching the weather is another great way to get your children involved. If the weather is hot, your kids will know to water their plants after school.
Weed Control
When you’re training kids to take care of the garden, you’re also teaching them to take responsibility for some of the undesirable aspects of life. For instance, there will come a time when they’ll have to help you control weeds or wipe out pests. Remember to get strong gloves for your kids so they’re equipped to pull stubborn weeds.
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