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Buddy Plants, Beer, and Blenders

Ask gardeners about homegrown pest control and you'll get a slew of creative responses: beer-filled dishes to attract slugs, a spray of juiced bugs to deter insect relatives, marigolds planted to repel nematodes, and so on. Will these strategies work...
Insect Safari

Overview Gardens usually have more insect inhabitants than plants! In this lesson, students sharpen their observation skills by going on an insect safari to learn more about these fascinating garden residents. Objective To compare preconceptions about...
Garden Buddies: Making Friends with Beneficial Insects

This ladybug larva can devour as many as 25 aphids each day. An adult ladybug beetle can eat up to 60 of the pests daily!Making new friends is probably the most exciting and scary part of the new school year for students. Fortunately, garden...
Exploring State Insects

Overview Most people can name their state flower and recognize their state flag, but they probably aren’t even aware that their state might have an insect emblem! In fact, 41 states have an official insect. In this lesson, students will learn about their...
The Garden Do-Gooders

Although humans fear and revere them, abhor and adore them, there are no inherently "bad" or "good" insects. They are all simply trying to make a living and create offspring according to their natural programming. But from a gardener's perspective, some...
Garden Sleuths

Gardens are full of interesting creatures that squirm, crawl, and fly. Your students can become garden detectives and try to discover who some of these visitors are and what they're up to. Challenge your kids to use their eagle eyes (and a hand lens, if...
Empowering Flowering

"In preparation for a life cycle unit, I took my second graders to a local farmer's market with the intent of finding seeds on the way and hidden in the produce we brought back," reports Marilyn VanDerWerff from Fremont, MI. Back in the classroom,...
Insect Appeal

What if your students don't show an immediate interest in exploring plants? "Our connections with the creatures who live in our garden provided the hook that eventually led my second language learners to want to explore plants and their flowers more...
Garden Safari

When Kathy Miller's first through fifth graders in Greenville, SC, set out on a spring safari, they were hunting for evidence of animal life in their school garden. "One of the first sightings my students made were the thousands of ladybugs that seemed...
Butterfly Controversy: Quandry Cultivates Critical Thinkers

Raising butterflies raised issues and dilemmas -- and prompted a valuable learning experience -- for fourth and fifth grade students at Mary Snow School in Bangor, ME. "Intrigued by an idea from parent volunteers, teachers and students decided to create...