Growing early literacy in the garden

Children and avid gardeners love spring as it means more time spent outdoors. If gardening is your favourite activity, then spending time in the garden with your little one is not just good fun but can be filled with endless opportunities for language and learning. 

Talk to your child about what you’re planning on planting in the garden. You might even like to draw a map of how you’d like the garden to look. 

Research plants online and talk how they grow or what type of plant you are looking for such as: “We need plants that don’t drink a lot of water, so we want to plant succulents, these types of plants are tough and drought resistant”. Conversations like these introduce new vocabulary and really help grow your child’s understanding of language.   

Once you’ve planted your seeds or plants you might like to keep a record of how much they grow each day, you can do this by taking a photo or by using a ruler. Get your child to help you take the photo or measure the plant. This can be an easy way to introduce concepts like size, height and width. 

You can even make a game of spending time in the garden by playing a game of can you find the mystery plant. Pick a plant or tree in the garden and start describing its features “I’m a green bush with lots of red flowers” Once your child gets the hang of it they’ll want to start describing mystery plants to you.  

Spending time in the garden is the ideal way to talk, sing, read and play with your little one.