Ideas for classroom projects

Here are just a few ideas to get you started. For additional inspiration, the educator resources page lists a number of organizations with many more project ideas. On the Internet, you can also find classroom project kits (for example, VeggieU’s classroom kit).

  • Observe how plants grow with or without light. Set up indoor grow lights and observe which plants respond to which wavelengths at which points in their life cycles.
  • Do worm composting (vermiculture). This is a great indoor activity for classrooms, it can be done year-round, and we can certainly use any resulting compost out in the raised beds. Denver Urban Gardens has free workshops on worm composting. Madeline Bechtold just took the October 1 workshop and is already gathering the materials to do worm composting in her home kitchen, so she will probably have some stories to share on that subject, and maybe even some compost, by December.
  • Grow a wall garden in a Woolly Pocket.
  • Grow a TickleMe plant. They can be purchased at TickleMePlant.com. Obviously a hoot for the preschool and kindergarten crowd, but even older students can use it for science experiments. The link also has a video that shows the plant in action.
  • Do lunchtime food demos. Ideas: Fruit and veggie show-and-tell and tastings. How to make lunches more nutritious and interesting. How the same vegetable can taste very different by adding oils, herbs, and spices and varying the cooking technique.
  • For one of the annual classroom celebrations, consider a produce party/classroom project. A week or two before the party, the kids vote on the fruits and vegetables they want to showcase at their party. Some kids choose to work with their parents to prepare appetizers, dips, and other treats to share at the party, while others research recipes or invent new ways to prepare a particular fruit or vegetable and present their thoughts through a poster, diorama, food samples, etc.
  • If you have a classroom or access to another school area that gets a lot of sunlight, set up and operate a classroom aquaponics station. A small station is not that hard or expensive to build. Madeline Bechtold has some simple plans she can pass on to you; there are also lots of Internet resources available.
  • Make next year’s garden plant marker signs. (We already have a bunch of black plastic signs and some white liquid chalk to start you off.)
  • Grow starter plants indoors and planting seeds in next year’s Denver School Lunch garden. This might be especially appropriate for the preschool/kindergarten kids to do (since DSL already maintains this garden for us).
  • Experiment to see if playing music affects plant growth. Create a music garden (http://www.kidsgardening.org/classroomstory/students-tune-music-garden for ideas on creating a music garden).
  • Grow seeds on windowsills and chart their growth. Try growing seeds in different types of soil and charting the results. Make seed tapes for the raised beds.
  • Paint/draw still lifes with vegetables and flowers. Sketch plants in the gardens.
  • Create garden art (sculptures, murals, etc.)
  • Design and build solar-powered garden ornaments
  • Encourage individual gardening-related projects for the WWA Science Fair.
  • Collaborate with Jefferson County 4-H. (They might have better facilities for animal husbandry projects than we currently do.)
  • Conduct soil testing and share the results with the rest of the school.
  • Do a project on insects in the garden (beneficial insects and/or pests).
  • Do a project on culinary and medicinal uses for common garden weeds.