The Ups and Downs of Gardening

Earlier this year, we made flower pots. We had some left over big plastic drink bottles. We cut them in half and then punched holes in the bottom. We painted the flower pots in bright colours. Some people worked in pairs and some people work by themselves.

The finished flower pots.

Next, we chose the flowers we wanted to plant. There were sunflowers, nigella, marigolds and many more to choose from. Then we filled our pots with manure to help make the soil better.

After collecting the manure we went for a short walk to find the best soil on the farm. It is very sandy on the farm so we had to try hard to find the right soil. We used sticks to mix the soil with the manure.

Back in the classroom, we planted our seeds. In Science, we learnt that plants need sun, water and air. We made sure we gave them these three things every day.

We kept a record of how our plants grew. After one day some people had 2 shoots, others didn't have any. We recorded the growth of our flowers for one week. Some people had 10 shoots after a week but Miriam still didn't have any. Unfortunately during the holidays our flowers didn't get enough sunlight and they had some water damage and they did not survive.

So, some of us decided to replant some seeds. Asha, whose father is a farmer and has been helping in the parents' garden, brought in some seeds for us to plant. These seeds have grown really well and we are enjoying watching the plants get bigger and grow more leaves each day.

We are hoping to replant some flowers and other plants soon. We learnt that gardening is not as easy as we thought. It can be hard to grow flowers! We will keep trying though.

Questions:
1. What do plants need?
2. What is manure?
3. Have you grown flowers or another plant before? Was it easy or difficult?
4. Plant some seeds of your own. We would love to hear about how they grow.