Children in Nature Quarterly: Summer in the Garden!
The garden is a special place in all seasons that gives young children, youth and teens an opportunity to interact, connect and foster a relationship with land and nature in the city through hands-on experiential learning.
Here are some summer snapshots:
Young children visited during Open Hours helping water plants, harvesting tomatoes, flowers, herbs, and planting seeds. They would also come back to visit their plants. Children who visited regularly as part of their preschool programs would bring their families to visit on the weekends sitting on the benches reading books, playing in the mud kitchen and sharing mint.
During the month of July, students from the SPS SPELL summer program at Argenziano visited the garden each week. They participated in a variety of activities that included sound mapping, native pollinator observation, games that required team work and turn taking, risky play and more. They also had a chance to try paper making and made garden snacks with ingredients from the garden. Herby lemonade, salsa, and garlicy butter were a hit! Many wonderful and engaging volunteer educators gave their time to support these visits.
A student from the Environmental Science study class at Somerville High who had visited in later spring with her class also joined to help harvest garlic one rainy morning. She brought her mom to help too. They left with some garlic and herbs grown and cared for by volunteers of all ages.
A Literacy specialist at the High School took the volunteer orientation and shared ideas of phenology data recording in the garden and an herbal tea blending class with her students.
The Somerville Family Learning Collaborative (SFLC) hosted several summer playgroups for families in English, Spanish and Nepali and also offered a baby and parent yoga class. Riverside Early Head Start visited several times with staff and the families they serve. They also had their end-of-program celebration for children moving on from their program in the garden.
A Tufts intern worked on a dichotomous key for herb identification for elementary aged students and another Growing Center volunteer created beautiful watercolor information sheets on the Three Sisters and Squash bee. We were able with the help of volunteers to translate this information from English to Spanish and Portuguese.
And as the seasons change, a few more snapshots: a 10 year old-visiting with their family asking for some work to do. They helped rake the lawn and spread wood chips.
A young child walking through the garden with a bug box in hand.
A toddler running happily into the garden saying, “this isn’t playgroup” and clearly knowing the way.
On a rainy Sunday morning a dad and daughter visit on their way doing neighborhood errands to look for Fairy Houses. Then they make one with large leaves and a cut flower.
A family with a new baby holding their baby up to the tall cosmos and red flowers of the bean plant, their tiny hand reaching out.
What a beautiful reminder that a garden is so much more than a place where things grow—it's a gathering place for community, curiosity, and connection. I love how these snapshots capture children of all ages forming real relationships with the land, from watering plants and making herby lemonade to simply returning on weekends to sit and share mint with family. The toddler who ran in saying "this isn't playgroup" while clearly knowing the way says it all. Thank you, Paula, for sharing these moments and for all the volunteers and educators who make this kind of hands-on, intergenerational learning possible.