Why Does Gardening Matter in Early Childhood?
We all know that spending time outdoors and in nature is important for connecting children to nature. However, gardening offers more than just connections to nature. It gives children the opportunity to actively participate in growing, caring for, observing and harvesting living things.
Gardening is more than just learning to grow flowers or food. It provides a rich context for learning, wellbeing, relationships, sustainability and connecting with Papatūānuku.
When gardening becomes part of everyday life within an early childhood centre, it becomes part of the curriculum, not something extra that has to be fitted around an already busy daily programme.
What do preschool children learn from growing food?
Growing their own food gives tamariki the opportunity to learn where their food comes from. It gives them direct experience of being involved in producing their own food and realising it doesn’t just come from the supermarket.
When children are involved in all the steps of growing their own food, from seed to plate, they start learning about growing seasonal foods. They learn the right time of the year to grow different fruits and vegetables, which in turn leads to seasonal eating as well. In my experience tamariki are more likely to eat different vegetables if they’ve been involved in growing it.
And, because the process of growing food from seed to plate takes time, they begin to develop an appreciation for their food and start to learn the basic principles of food production and the life cycles of different plants.
What learning opportunities does gardening provide for preschoolers?
Engaging tamariki in gardening creates a meaningful context for learning. The garden will naturally create real problems, questions and discoveries.
Let’s take the question, ‘Why has this seed germinated and this one hasn’t?’
A simple question like this can lead to discussion, observation, prediction and investigation. Children might compare how the seeds were planted, how much water and light they received, and how long they have been growing. They can make predictions about what might happen next and test their ideas.
The garden provides a real-world opportunity for children to learn about science concepts such as:
Soil Health - As tamariki become involved in caring for the garden they learn about making the soil healthy, so it grows healthy kai.
Weather and seasonal changes - The more involved children become in gardening the more they will learn about how the weather and changing seasons impact the garden and what they can grow.
Plants - Gardening helps tamariki learn that different plants have different growing requirements, and they see how plants grow and produce food.
Insects - Learning about different insects and their role in the garden helps children learn about biodiversity.
Life cycles - Plant and insect life cycles naturally occur in the garden, making it the perfect place for tamariki to learn about them.
Problem-solving - Investigating what plants need to grow healthy and working out what needs to happen when they don’t thrive.
Gardening naturally introduces tamariki to mathematical thinking and concepts. When children become involved in gardening, they learn that plants are diverse, have different shaped seeds, grow to different sizes, and can change in form and shape as they mature. Some plants can also be grouped into families so their seeds and leaves may be similar. Gardening supports math concept learning such as:
Counting and numbers
Measurement
Shape, Colour and Size
Pattern recognition
Sorting and classifying
Sequencing and time
Gardening naturally supports tamariki language development. It provides a real-word context for having conversations about what they have been doing, what they can see, hear, smell, feel. It introduces them to a new vocabulary - the vocabulary of gardening. It also introduces early literacy skills to children, as they learn how symbols represent the plants they are growing, and listen to stories about growing things.
When tamariki garden in an early childhood setting they learn alongside their peers, building social skills in a natural way. They may need to engage in turn-taking, sharing, negotiation and having conversations, all skills they can transfer into other situations within and throughout their lives.
How does gardening support children’s well-being?
When gardening is part of the everyday programme, it supports children’s well-being every day.
The garden is a place that encourages slowing down and becoming calm. Tamariki can be engaged in meaningful real-life work that gives them natural rewards when they nurture and care for their plants. As children engage in regular gardening, they learn how to care for living things. They develop an ethic of care and respect that can be transferred into other areas of their lives.
In my experience of gardening with young children, I have seen the garden provide an environment where children who find other experiences challenging, participate and succeed. I have worked with many children who struggle to engage in tasks or have difficulty in social situations, become engaged and focused when they garden. They turn-take and share with peers and develop a sense of responsibility and pride in the work they do.
I have also observed many tamariki who become skilled at garden tasks engage in tuakana-teina with their less skilled peers, showing them how to sow seeds, plant seedlings and water.
The nature of gardening also supports children’s physical health and makes movement enjoyable as they dig, lift, pull, pour, and pick. As their gardening skills develop, and they successfully grow produce, so too does their sense of achievement and belonging.
How does gardening develop children’s agency, confidence and independence?
Working in a garden offers children real-life opportunities to care for a living thing, whether it’s a flower, vegetable, herb or even the soil. Gardening teaches tamariki where plants come from, how they grow, and what they need to thrive.
When children are fully involved in gardening, they can become confident and competent, choosing what to grow, sowing the seeds themselves, planting seedlings, watering, fertilising, and harvesting. As they care for their garden, they take on responsibility, observing what is happening to their plants and making decisions about when to water. They will learn when a vegetable is ready to harvest and how to do that.
When something isn’t going right, like slugs and snails eating young leaves, or plants not growing well, tamariki can be involved in problem solving and coming up with solutions to protect and nurture the plants.
Gardening is not always successful, seeds don’t always germinate and plants do sometimes die. These types of things will help children learn that failure is ok, and we can problem solve what might have happened, learn from it, and try again.
When young children garden, they aren’t simply learning about gardening. They are participating in a real-life activity that gives them opportunities to experience competence and agency.
How does gardening help tamariki connect with Papatūānuku?
Papatūānuku is the mother of all things - including the soil and what lives within it, the plants, and the water that sustain life. Being involved with regular gardening helps to foster children's connections with Papatūānuku. They become kaitiaki of their garden as they learn how to care for the soil, and care for the plants as they grow.
When tamariki garden they develop an understanding of interconnectedness, for example collecting their food scraps to feed the worm farm or to make into compost which then goes into the soil to improve its quality so it can grow healthy food, which once harvested, processed and eaten, produces food scraps to go back into the cycle again.
Gardening also helps children learn about the seasons, and how each season impacts the garden and what they can grow. In this way they observe the natural processes that occur, giving them a respect for Papatūānuku and the natural world.
How does gardening bring Te Whāriki to life?
When we look at Te Whāriki, the early childhood curriculum, through a gardening lens, we can see that it is embedded throughout every strand, and it’s possible to link all aspects of tamariki learning to it. However, it’s important to note that not every gardening experience needs to be deliberately linked to every strand. Rather, gardening naturally creates opportunities across the curriculum, and kaiako can notice and respond to the learning that emerges.
Wellbeing | Mana Atua
Gardening can contribute to children's physical and emotional wellbeing as they become involved in choosing what to grow and learning about success and failure in the garden.
Belonging | Mana Whenua
Caring for a garden in an early childhood setting can contribute to children's sense of place and belonging as they grow food they are familiar with and become involved in caring for their garden.
Contribution | Mana Tangata
In an early childhood setting the garden is a shared space where each child can take on responsibility for caring for it, and they learn to work alongside each other as they garden.
Communication | Mana Reo
The garden creates authentic opportunities for engaging tamariki in conversation, telling and listening to stories about gardening, and building a vocabulary that includes gardening terms. It also provides a real-life context for practicing drawing and learning pre-literacy skills.
Exploration | Mana Aotūroa
Opportunities to regularly garden give children a real-world context to investigate life-cycles and how plants grow through the seasons. They can engage in investigations of how to keep soil healthy, and what insects are good or bad for the garden.
Gardening doesn't have to be an added extra to the curriculum. It can be a meaningful context through which the curriculum comes alive for children.
How does gardening teach children about sustainability?
Sustainability is about reducing our impact on the environment. Therefore, gardening is a meaningful way to teach children about sustainable practices. Growing their own food is an authentic way to learn about reducing waste, reducing food miles, and eating nutritious food.
Growing food in a garden is sustainability in action. They learn where their food comes from and that it doesn’t have to be bought at the supermarket.
When tamariki are engaged in gardening they are learning about systems that make sustainable living possible. It is most powerful when children are involved fully in the process of gardening on a regular basis, all year round.
Gardening isn’t just about growing vegetables
A gardening programme in early childhood doesn't have to mean a large productive vegetable garden. A pot of herbs, a few containers, a seed-raising area, a worm farm or a small collection of seasonal plants can all provide meaningful opportunities for children to engage with growing and caring for living things. The value of gardening is in the relationships and experience, not in having a perfect productive garden.
So why should we garden with tamariki?
Gardening helps tamariki understand where their food comes from, and allows them to learn concepts of science, maths, and language through authentic experiences. It supports their wellbeing and provides a real-world context for developing agency and confidence.
Gardening helps tamariki connect with Papatūānuku and develop an understanding of sustainability.
When we garden with tamariki, we’re not simply teaching them how to grow vegetables. We’re giving them opportunities to care, investigate, contribute, create, problem-solve, connect and understand their place in the natural world.
Gardening means participating in a living system and watching it change over time. Gardening in early childhood brings the curriculum to life.
