There’s this common misconception that gardening is an activity best suited for the elderly.
However, that is not even remotely true. You see, studies have shown that there are many benefits of introducing gardening to kids at age toddlers to preschoolers. Through garden play, children acquire and improve crucial skills, have fun, and develop self-confidence all the while enjoying a nature-friendly childhood in the Montessori way.

But, how exactly does gardening help a child’s development?
What do you learn from gardening?
Well in this article, at MontessoriNature.com we will go over just that.
Skills learned from gardening engage all senses

A garden can be an interactive playground for kids that will engage all of their senses. It’s where they can touch and feel the fruits of their labor, fancy the brightly colored flowers, grow accustomed to natural scents, and the sound of rustling shrubs. Of course, you can do indoor gardening with children, too.
To involve all the senses will feed both curiosity and passion in toddlers and thus, the love for gardening and the science behind it, says Gena Lorraine, a fantastic gardening & horticulturist expert. It is at an early age when parents should nourish these activities the most, she added.
But what are the skills children learn from nature and how does gardening help a child’s development?
- Reliability and responsibility when it comes to taking care of a plant day after day;
- Self-confidence: nothing is more rewarding than the fruits of our own labour;
- Learning cause and effect – do good, not bad;
- Curiosity in species, growing tips, Botanics and more;
- Physical activity: gardening makes you move a lot;
- Exploring texture: Gaining insight on density, weight, malleability, permeability, and more;
- Growing the love of nature: putting love in what they grow;
- Teamwork: friends or family;
- Math: counting days, measuring nutrition, light exposure and more;
- Creativity: crafting own landscape designs or painting a pair of wellies.
When gardening with your kids, try growing plants that possess sensory and textural qualities. Here are a few good examples of sensory plants suitable for kindergarten gardening.
- Touch – Houseleek, Jerusalem sage, Lamb’s ears and Snapdragons can teach your children the different textures plants have;
- Taste – Strawberries, Chives, Rosemary and Cherry tomatoes are just a few of many healthy and tasty treats, simple to grow for children to enjoy (especially when eaten, of course);
- Smell – Lavender, Chocolate cosmos, Jasmine and Lemon balm give off heady fragrances;
- Sound – Greater quaking-grass, Sweet corn and Bamboo rustle when the wind blows;
- Sight – Spider flowers, Sulfur Cosmos, Chameleon plant and Sunflowers are great as they’re colourful and visually appealing.
Gardening encourages children to eat healthier.

It’s no secret that fruits and vegetables taste better when you grow them yourself. This holds true for children too.
Getting toddlers or preschoolers involved in gardening allows them to experience plant care and nourish a responsible, consistent and positive attitude towards hard work.
For self-grown fruits and veggies children will take great pride, you can rest assured.
Before you can think of it, they will be eating tomatoes, spinach, and even celery! By explaining the importance of gardening from an early age, healthy eating will become a day-to-day habit shaping the foundations of any young mind.
Gardening enhances fine motor development

It goes without saying that gardening and fine motor skills go hand in hand. While in the garden, children are constantly practicing their locomotor skills without thinking about it. In the garden, children have to move around a lot to tackle tasks like watering, fertilizing, pruning, mounting plant stakes, digging, weeding, bending, and gathering, organizing, and storing seeds.
This is how gardening allows children to develop a proactive and healthy routine in life.
Gardening introduces children to science
Using gardening as a way to teach children science is a fairly new and unique approach but considerably rewarding. Not only do young ones become a part of the learning process, but they acquire practical knowledge not found in textbooks.
Here are some examples of sciences that can be taught in the garden :
- Botany – through the interaction with plants and dissection of seeds;
- Chemistry – through composting;
- Math – through the planting and management of seeds;
- Meteorology – monitoring the weather and its effects on the garden.
Gardening reduces both the level and effect of stress

Gardening can be a huge stress reliever for children as it teaches how to relax, calm down and control emotions. Spending time in nature, amongst flowers and trees has been proven to make both children and the elderly feel happier.
According to many studies, working out in the garden for just 30 minutes a day reduces the levels of the stress hormone cortisol significantly. Therefore, gardening is a perfect activity to introduce your children to, as it keeps the stress away.
Gardening teaches young one’s patience, improves focus, and enhances memory, too

Nowadays, children have an ever-shorter attention span mainly because of the immediate gratification that our digital age provides.
A great way to teach children patience and also improve their focus is through regular garden care.
- To achieve that you need to be patient and let children make mistakes to learn from;
- Give children their own space and actively encourage them to take responsibility for the plants they sow, this, in turn, will instil in them gratification when their plants progress;
- It’s recommendable to start with sowing fast growers as that way kids can witness the fruits of their labour over the course of just a few weeks and won’t lose interest;
- The constant involvement of children in the gardening process improves alertness, memory and even cognitive abilities, thanks to math and repetition.
Gardening teaches children the responsibility of preserving the environment
Helping kids get into the habit of caring for seeds and plants they’ve sown can instill a great sense of responsibility. Be sure to prepare and follow a checklist of daily, weekly and monthly chores. Аlso, monitor your child’s gardening progress and do your best to help them when needed, without interfering too much. This is how gardening develops children, by teaching them that good things take time and effort.
Gardening nourishes self-confidence

Confidence is crucial for the healthy development of any child. It might come as no surprise but gardening helps children feel more capable. Looking after a plant, from sowing until bloom, and seeing their hard work pay off can substantially boost a child’s sense of competence.
When it comes to childcare, the benefits of delayed gratitude take long to teach but at the end of the day, are absolutely worth it.
Gardening with toddlers bonds the family
It should be present in every household. To set up you don’t need to have a huge backyard, not really. A few pots on the balcony are absolutely sufficient. The time families spend in the garden helps strengthen their bonds to create multiple and meaningful memories. As children learn they set solid grounds fоr great adulthood or something. What they like and what they don’t. What is wrong and what is right.
Altogether, gardening in childcare is an interesting, educational, healthy, and social activity that every child deserves. Although growing a garden as a regular activity can take a while, the payoff is more than worth it!

Plant Life Cycle
This printable is perfect to include in your Spring and Summer unit and present to the students before they start planting seeds in the garden.
Forest Vocabulary 3-part Cards
Forest Vocabulary 3-part Cards for Kindergarten, First, Second Graders. This file includes:
36 themed vocabulary cards (four to one page) with forest elements – plants, wild berries, wildflowers, trees, pine cones, fungi with large unique graphics and text to match.
Spring Unit Printable Hands-on Activities for the Montessori Classroom
Spring Montessori Unit for children aged 2-6.
Changes in nature present plenty of opportunities for explorations and learning. This pack will provide your students with hours of Spring themed engaging activities that will assist them in developing fine motor skills, number recognition, reading, logical thinking.
Hands-on activities, three-part cards, student booklets, adventure hunt, lacing cards, counting cards, and more!
Plants, Animals, and Fungi Sorting Cards - Nature Curriculum in Cards
Sorting and classifying activity with plants, animals, and fungi.
The printable features photographic cards for sorting and clipart for “cut, color, and sort” activity.
Fruits and Vegetables Vocabulary 3 Part Cards
Three-part cards are an excellent tool to help interactively learn new vocabulary and spelling. Classified cards can be used to enrich the child’s vocabulary, to develop reading, writing, and classification skills while broadening the child’s knowledge of the world. Create bilingual/multilingual cards for the students in your minority language with ease.
Flowers Of The Continents 3 Part Cards
Explore the fascinating world of botany with these Flowers of the Continents 3-part cards. This printable would be a colorful addition to your continent folders.
Flowers - Object to Picture Matching Activity with Safari Toob
Three-part cards with eight images for the object to photo-matching activity. The printable features clear real-life photographs.
It includes a set of flower vocabulary cards – rose, tulip, hibiscus, bird of paradise, daffodil, sunflower, lotus, orchid.
Types of Flowers - Nature Curriculum in Cards
Three-part and description cards with eighteen different flowering plants. The printable features isolated images of commonly known flowers such as lotus, sunflower, pansy, orchid, tulip, rose, blue plumbago, calla lily, carnation, dahlia, daisy, bird of paradise, iris, lily, magnolia, narcissus, petunia, poppy.
Types of Spring Flowers 3 Part Cards and B&W Booklet Printable
Twelve beautiful flowers of Spring. Three-part cards feature colorful clipart images.

What's Inside A Flower?: And Other Questions About Science & Nature
Budding backyard scientists can start exploring their world with this stunning introduction to these flowery show-stoppers--from seeds to roots to blooms. Learning how flowers grow gives kids beautiful building blocks of science and inquiry.

The Reason for a Flower: A Book About Flowers, Pollen, and Seeds (Explore!)
The reason for a flower is to manufacture seeds, but Ruth Heller shares a lot more about parts of plants and their functions in her trademark rhythmic style.

Ultimate Explorer Field Guide: Wildflowers
What do you call a garden filled with lots of flowers? A polli-nation! Nat Geo Kids is back with the newest fact- and photo-filled Ultimate Explorer Field Guide, and this one packs some real flower power! This guide to wildflowers will make kids stop and look for all kinds of blossoms blooming right under their noses.

The Flower Alphabet Book (Jerry Pallotta's Alphabet Books)
And they're only two of the flowers in this book of bright colors and delightful information. Young readers will be fascinated to find out what flower can be used to make a doll, which flower flavors tea, and which flower farmers feed to chickens.

Sun, Water, and Soil - Teaching Kids How Plants Grow - Children's Biology Books
Put in healthy soil, add some water and let it grow in the sun. This is how a plant would thrive. But there are many other things to know aside from this general truth! The purpose of this educational book is to empower your child to become environmentally aware. By improving his/her knowledge about planting, you are also preparing him/her to plant.

National Geographic Kids Look and Learn: In My Garden (Look & Learn)
From planting seeds to watering them to watching seedlings grow, young readers are introduced to gardens and some of the charming creatures often found there. Using simple, age-appropriate text paired with colorful photos, Look & Learn books introduce children to a subject on one spread and then show it in real-life context on the next.

I Can Grow a Flower (Life Cycle Board Books)
Teach your child how a tiny seed grows into a flower in this fascinating lift-the-flap garden story. A pullout height chart ends the book--a great way for children to remember how a sunflower grows, and to measure how fast your child grows, too!

Gardening with Emma: Grow and Have Fun: A Kid-to-Kid Guide
Thirteen-year-old Emma Biggs is passionate about gardening and eager to share her passion with other kids!

Big Book of Blooms (The Big Book Series)
The next installment in the popular Big Book series is a fascinating introduction to some of the most magnificent and surprising flowering plants from around the world.

Planting a Rainbow
In this perennial classic with sturdy board book pages by Caldecott Honor–winning author Lois Ehlert, little ones learn the colors of the rainbow as they watch a plants grow in a beautifully vibrant garden.

Flowers
Explore a lush garden of plant life. . . . from your bookshelf! Packed with science concepts, this picture book will tell you everything you need to know about flowers.

Flowers (Plant Parts)
Discover the beautiful science of flowers! Through full-color photos and simple, easy-to-follow text, this nonfiction book introduces emergent readers to the basics of botany, including information on how flowers grow, along with their uses. All

The Dandelion Seed: A Life Cycle Nature Book for Kids (Plants For Children, Science For Kindergarten)
Follow the journey of a tiny dandelion seed who was afraid to let go. With a poignant, simple storytelling and gorgeous artwork, this best-selling picture book introduces plant life cycles while reminding us to let go and embrace change.

Wildflowers (National Geographic: My First Pocket Guide)
From the familiar buttercup to the dazzling Indian paintbrush, this colorful guide features 34 flowers that grow naturally in woodlands, grasslands, deserts, and wetlands of the U.S. and Canada. The book also looks at pollination and the parts of a flower.

Teacher Created Materials - TIME For Kids Informational Text: Good Work: Plant Life - Grade K - Guided Reading Level A
This picture book teaches young readers what plants need to grow. Featuring vivid images and simple, repetitive phrases, students will be eager to learn about what plants need to grow. This title correlates to Next Generation Science Standards with a focus on plants.

Lola Plants a Garden (Lola Reads)
How does your garden grow? Book-loving Lola is inspired by a collection of garden poems that she reads with her mommy. She wants to plant her own garden of beautiful flowers, so she and Mommy go to the library to check out books about gardening. They choose their flowers and buy their seeds.

Mrs. Peanuckle's Flower Alphabet (Mrs. Peanuckle's Alphabet)
From the aster to the zinnia, Mrs. Peanuckle introduces very young children to 26 types of flowers from across the globe. For each one, she offers a single defining characteristic, some of them very surprising.

Flowers (Nature Explorers)
A first nature book about flowers for children, this is the perfect companion for young minds eager to learn about the world of flowering plants.

National Geographic Readers: Seed to Plant
Kids see plants, flowers, and trees around them every day. In this lively and educational reader, they'll learn how those plants grow. Kids will take this magical journey from seed pollination to plant growth, learning about what plants need to thrive and grow with the same careful text, brilliant photographs, and the fun approach National Geographic Readers are known for.

Trees, Leaves, Flowers and Seeds: A Visual Encyclopedia of the Plant Kingdom (Smithsonian)
A unique guide to the extraordinary world of plants, from the smallest seeds to the tallest trees.
Packed with more than 1,000 incredible images and full of fascinating facts, this beautiful children's book takes you on an exciting adventure through the wonders of the plant kingdom.

From Seed to Plant
With simple language and bright illustrations, non-fiction master Gail Gibbons introduces young readers to the processes of pollination, seed formation, and germination. Important vocabulary is reinforced with accessible explanation and colorful, clear diagrams showing the parts of plants, the wide variety of seeds, and how they grow.

The Tiny Seed: With seeded paper to grow your own flowers! (The World of Eric Carle)
Eric Carle’s classic story of the life cycle of a flower is told through the adventures of a tiny
seed. This mini-book includes a piece of detachable seed-embedded paper housed on the inside front cover. Readers can plant the entire piece of paper and watch as their very own tiny seeds grow into beautiful wildflowers.
Gardening is so important for kids to learn. You are spot on with all the lessons it holds for them.
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