Gardening activity!

Over the past couple of months Thailand has been receiving continuous rainfall which prompted the discussion about rain water at our classrooms. The children shared their ideas on the importance of rain water and how to take care of themselves during rainy season.

Watering the crops activity

We also talked about different types of food crops that grew during rainy seasons and we saw curiosity and deep interests on the lesson as the children gave amazing suggestions from corn, morning glory, salad, long beans, cucumbers, pumpkins, kales, onions, carrots etc.

We extended our discussion to the outside of our classrooms in order to have the children interact and experience nature through gardening.

Dr. Maria Montessori believed that nature was the most important place of learning for children. Montessori also saw the importance of connecting the children with nature in order to give them opportunity to experience with the natural world and to teach them to respect it.

Harvesting  the vegetables at Wangpha,Huay mai pen & Namdip
Schools

Thereafter, we invited the children to choose the 

seed crops they wished to plant, and surprisingly most of them settled for morning glory, onions, Kales while others on corn.

The children loved the idea of digging the soft soaked soil and getting their hands dirty. Together we prepared the garden beds, made rows, planted the seeds, and sometimes watered and watched them sprout and grow. Each morning the children could visit the garden to check on any new growth and learned a lot more by observing the growing process and nurturing the seedlings from beginning to grown plants. Besides planting and nurturing the plants the children were sure of harvesting and preparing their crops for food which provided them with a unique opportunity to learn how to keep their bodies healthy by eating lots of vegetables. The gardening activity encouraged the children to be good environment stewards and also created a sense of responsibility.

Washing the vegeatables - Practical life activity

 “When children come into contact with nature, they reveal their strength”. Dr.  Maria Montessori

Finally the children enjoyed their vegetables meal- Yummy, Yummy!