Garden-Based Learning in BasicEducation: A Historical Review

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SUMMER 2002

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Contributing author:Aarti

Subramaniam, M.A.Graduate Research

Assistant,4-H Center for

Youth Development,University of California,

Davis

INTRODUCTION

Most people today would agree that theprocess of acquiring an education

should involve more than obtaining highgrades. Education is concerned with whatstudents know and can do, how they interactwith others and what they will face in theworld (Drake,1998). It means being able toapply skills learned within real-life contexts.Historically, educational systems have beenestablished with the purpose of developingacademic, vocational and life skills as wellas influencing moral, social and personaldevelopment. The methods of instruction aswell as the curriculum content have been in aconstant state of flux over the ages, reflectingthe cultural, social and economic values andneeds of communities. Today, the ideas ofexperiential and naturalistic education,integrated curriculum, and the ideals ofenvironmental education and agriculturalliteracy have found a new context forinstruction beyond the four walls of theclassroom–the school garden.

Why are school gardens gaining popu-larity in some parts of the United States andacross the globe? Is this a new trend? Howhas garden-based education impacted theareas of academics, environmental education,nutritional awareness and community life?This review addresses these questions bytracing the history of garden-based learning,describing the philosophy and underlyingtheoretical frameworks of this approach andpresenting the results of specific evaluationsof some garden-based programs.

History and Philosophy ofGarden-based Learning

“ . . . to open the child’s mind to his naturalexistence, develop his sense of responsibilityand of self dependence, train him to respect theresources of the earth, teach him the obligationsof citizenship, interest him sympathetically inthe occupations of men, touch his relation tohuman life in general, and touch his imaginationwith the spiritual forces of the world”(Bailey, 1909).

The idea of incorporating the natural outdoorsas an integral part of children’s educationalcurriculum is not new. The philosophy behindgarden-based education is actually anamalgamation of the philosophies behindexperiential education, ecological literacy andenvironmental awareness, and agriculturalliteracy. In other words, it involves teachingchildren through personal discovery in naturalsettings, where they learn ecologicalprinciples that govern all life, as well asdevelop a sense of connection with the land.Tracing these thoughts back to theirpropagators we find some of the mostprominent philosophers and leaders in thefield of education setting the course forcontemporary thinking about school gardensand garden-based learning.

Early Philosophers: Comenius,Rousseau, Pestalozzi and FroebelAs far back as the seventeenth century, JohnAmos Comenius (1592–1670) believed thateducation should be universal, optimistic,practical, and innovative and should focus not

only on school and family life but also ongeneral social life. He stated “A school gardenshould be connected with every school,where children can have the opportunity forleisurely gazing upon trees, flowers andherbs, and are taught to appreciate them”(Weed, 1909, cited in Sealy, 2001). Ahundred years later, Jean-Jacques Rousseau(1712-1778) described the defect of teachinga child “about” things rather than the thingsthemselves. He stated, “You think you areteaching what the world is like; he is onlylearning the map.” Rousseau emphasized theimportance of nature in education, statingthat nature was the child’s greatest teacherand that “his knowledge of the natural worldserves as a foundation for his later learning”(cited in Sealy, 2001).

Rousseau’s teachings were adopted byJohann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827) whospoke of observation and activity in learningrather than learning mere words. Pestalozzistarted his school after working with 25orphans using gardening, farming, and homeskills as practical education. He visualized thebalance between the three elements, “hands,heart, and head.” Friedrich Froebel (1782-1852) who studied Pestalozzi’s fundamentalprinciples, went a step further to emphasize“doing” as well as observing in such a waythat is not merely mechanical, but ratherincorporates the creative energies of thechild such that the child is “elevated toproductive activity in the full sense of theword” (Froebel Web site, 1998). Froebel wasone of the most effective proponents ofschool gardens in the nineteenth century(Sealy, 2001).

Philosophers of the 20th Century:Montessori, Dewey and GandhiMaria Montessori (1870–1952), the founderof the Montessori method of education whichushered in a new era in child education,spoke of “first the education of the senses,then the education of the intellect.” Shebelieved that a garden could help children intheir moral development and appreciation ofnature. In her own words, “When he (thestudent) knows that the life of the plants thathave been sown depends upon his care inwatering them…without which the littleplant dries up…the child becomes vigilant, asone who is beginning to feel a mission in life”(Montessori, 1912).

John Dewey (1859–1952) referred to thereorganization of rural schools and theutilization of agriculture in education in theearly part of the twentieth century as a“movement towards greater freedom and anidentification of the child’s school life withhis environment and outlook” (Dewey, 1915).With reference to school gardens, he statesthat in such schools, “opportunities exist forreproducing situations of life, and foracquiring and applying information and ideasin carrying forward of progressive experi-ences. Gardening need not be taught eitherfor the sake of preparing future gardeners, oras an agreeable way of passing time. It affordsan avenue of approach to the knowledge ofthe place farming and horticulture have hadin the history of the human race and whichthey occupy in present social organization.Carried on in an environment educationallycontrolled, they are means for making a studyof facts of growth, the chemistry of soil, therole of light, air, moisture, injurious andhelpful animal life, etc. It is pertinent to notethat in the history of man, the sciences grewgradually out of useful social occupations”(Dewey, 1944).

Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948),another naturalistic educator, believed likeRousseau that natural and rural environ-ments are important educative contexts(Aggarwal, 1985). Gandhi made a valiantattempt at rescuing education from theconfines of the fours walls of a classroom.Gandhi’s model of self-sufficiency of schoolswas tailored toward developing communitieswhere government funding for education wasnot adequate. He believed that a certain craftsuch as spinning, could be used as aneducational context, and also enable theschool to operate self-sufficiently(Aggarwal, 1985).

Tracing the History of Garden-based Learning and SchoolGardens

The First School Gardens in Europeand AustraliaIn 1811 Prussia, the first compulsory schoolsystem that included gardening wasdeveloped, and in 1869 school gardensbecame a law. Erasmus Schwab, who washired to enforce this law, published The PublicSchool Garden in 1871 emphasizing that the

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Today, the ideas of experi-ential and naturalisticeducation, integratedcurriculum, and theideals of environmentaleducation and agriculturalliteracy have found a newcontext for instructionbeyond the four wallsof the classroom–theschool garden.

natural sciences and agricultural andvocational sciences could be learned in thegarden (Sealy, 2001). New educationaltheories swept the world around the turn ofthe century and the kindergarten movementdeveloped by Froebel started to spreadquickly around Europe. The school child wasno longer considered an “informationreceptacle” but rather a “growing flower”(Robin, 2001). In Australia, the schoolgarden movement was strongly influenced bythe annual School Garden Conference in1903, sponsored by the Australian NativesAssociation. This led to the propagation ofschool gardens in the early decades of thetwentieth century that were viewed as idealfor integration with the educationalcurriculum and for incorporating thestandards of “progressive conservation” withits concerns for the responsible stewardshipof nature as well as the ideas aboutconnections between nature, hard work andmoral improvement (Robin, 2001).

School Gardens in the United StatesAt the end of the 19th century, theMassachusetts Horticulture Society wasinstrumental in providing educators with abackground for teaching gardening inschools in the United States. In 1891 HenryLincoln Clapp was sent to Europe to studyschool gardens and on his return he installedthe first school garden in America at GeorgePutnam School in Roxbury, Massachusetts.Van Evrie Kilpatrick, who was hired asdirector of the School Garden Association ofNew York wrote, “School gardens should bemaintained by the city, the city owes it to thechildren whom it has deprived of breathingplaces and beauty spots through want offoresight” (Sealy, 2001). Thus, school gardensin the United States were initially introduced inurban schools for aesthetic rather thaneducational reasons (Sealy, 2001).

Youth gardening became a nationalmovement and by 1918 every state inAmerica and every province in Canada had atleast one school garden (Sealy, 2001). In1916 over one million students contributedto the production of food during the wareffort, following the proclamation byPresident Woodrow Wilson. However, theeducational value of school gardensdiminished and waned after World War I andtheir brief resurgence during World War II bythe growing of Victory Gardens declinedafter 1944. Playgrounds and athletic fields

took over garden plots and schools becamemore focused on technology (Sealy, 2001).

The second wave of school gardens inthe United States occurred between 1964 and1975 as an offshoot of the educational reformstrategy for the “war on poverty” (Meyer,1997, cited in Yamamoto, 2000). With thebirth of the environmental movement,public concern for the environment led tothe conception of school gardens as aprogressive, interactive educational link forchildren to understand and connect with“life processes” and environmentalunderstanding. However, school gardens didnot gain firm roots in public education,weakened by the conservatism of the 1980s(Yamamoto, 2000).

In 1993, The American HorticulturalSociety held its first symposium based onyouth gardening entitled “Children, Plants,and Gardens: Educational Opportunities.”The aim was to recognize ways in whichchildren’s gardens could support educationalcurricula (Sealy, 2001). This led to the spreadof school gardens during the last decade.

Theoretical Frameworks ofGarden-based Learning

A scientific inquiry into why gardens are auseful context for learning could be in-formed by research in the fields ofdevelopmental and educational psychology,from theories of experiential education andintelligence, and theories underlying thebenefits of integrated curricula.

Theories of Experiential LearningExperiential education is a process throughwhich a learner constructs knowledge, skill,and value from direct experiences. Accordingto Kolb’s experiential learning model (Kolb,1975 in Weatherford & Weatherford, 1987)concrete experience leads to observations andreflections. These, in turn, result in theformation of abstract concepts andgeneralizations of these concepts as well asthe capacity to test the implications of theseconcepts in new situations.

In a socio-ecological model of a child’soutdoor landscape (Moore & Young, 1978),it is proposed that a child lives simul-taneously in three interdependent realms ofexperience: the physiological-psychologicalenvironment of body/mind, the sociologicalenvironment of interpersonal relations and

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In 1891 Henry LincolnClapp was sent to Europeto study school gardensand on his return heinstalled the first schoolgarden in America atGeorge Putnam School inRoxbury, Massachusetts.

cultural values, and the physiographiclandscape of spaces, objects, persons, andnatural and built elements. The freedom ofthe outdoor environment serves as a balanceto a child’s supervised indoor environment,resulting in volitional learning.

Theories of IntelligenceIntelligence is identified in reference to asocially recognized and valued role thatappears to rely heavily on a particularintellectual capacity (Gardner, 1999).Gardner suggests that we have at least eightintelligences, namely, linguistic, musical,logical-mathematical, spatial, bodilykinesthetic, interpersonal and intrapersonaland that only two–logical-mathematical andlinguistic–are given importance in schools.The latest addition to the seven intelligences,the naturalist intelligence is defined as theperson’s ability to recognize and classify hisor her natural environment. Gardner claimsthat just as children are ready to masterlanguage at an early age, so too are theypredisposed to explore the world of nature(Gardner, 1999). When the method ofinstruction is geared toward all the differenttypes of intelligence, a learner can be said tohave learned more completely, having anopportunity to use his or her differentlearning styles (Drake, 1998).

Developmental TheoriesDevelopmental psychologists have attemptedto study children’s relationships with natureand whether an innate sense of kinship withnature manifests by the time they reach acertain age (Tuan, 1978). Edith Cobb (1969)wrote that middle childhood (from approxi-mately five to twelve years, the periodbetween the “strivings of animal infancy andthe storms of adolescence”) is when the“natural world is experienced in some highlyevocative way.” Tuan (1978) additionallysuggests that children have to be taught byadults about their natural environment, as“nature is an inarticulate teacher.” Childrenshow a natural curiosity about the world, butthis curiosity may be easily repressed if adultsfail to nurture it.

Benefits of an Integrated CurriculumGarden-based learning offers a context forintegrated learning. An integrated curriculumis often associated with real-life problems incontrast with a traditional subject–based

curriculum. This provides a vehicle forhigher order thinking as students arechallenged to move beyond memorization, tosee patterns and relationships and pursue atopic in depth. They are engaged in con-structing knowledge rather than accumu-lating information and they also developanalysis and synthesis skills (Drake, 1998).

Contemporary Trends

The contemporary impetus to the schoolgarden movement in the United States islargely influenced by the thoughts ofeducators, environmentalists, and agriculturalreformists. In 1995, California’s State SchoolSuperintendent Delaine Eastin mandated “agarden in every school” to “create oppor-tunities for our children to discover freshfood, make healthier food choices, andbecome better nourished.” Though this aimhas not been fully realized, Eastin’s visiongave impetus to the development of gardensin other states as well.

With regard to the value of outdoorexperience on child development,David Orr, author of Earth in Mind (1994)and Ecological Literacy (1992) states thatchildren raised in ecologically barren settingsare deprived of the sensory stimuli and thekind of imaginative experience that can onlycome from biological richness. Robin Moore,director of the Natural Learning Initiative(1995), suggests that children’s gardening canbe introduced within the broader frame ofreference of sustainable development,regenerative design, and biodesign. He arguesthat children, the future consumers andparticipants of democracy, must interact dailywith an educational environment containinga diversity of living ecosystems. Gardening inthe primary grades is “the most feasible”pedagogical approach for ensuring thistype of daily learning experience as well asfor “reversing a worrisome trend” in theopposite direction.

Alice Waters, a prominent figure in theschool garden and organic agriculturalmovement as well as the founder of “TheEdible Schoolyard” in Berkeley, California,believes that having a garden for foodproduction at schools will teach compassion,patience, and self-discipline. The “EdibleSchoolyard” reflects this belief as a model inthe education of social responsibility,community participation, and sustainable

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Garden-based learningoffers a context forintegrated learning. Anintegrated curriculum isoften associated withreal-life problems incontrast with a traditionalsubject–based curriculum.

agriculture. The program involves studentsin all aspects of farming a one-acre garden,including preparing, serving, and eating thefood harvested.

Taking a glimpse at trends across theglobe, Learning Through Landscapes (LTL)is an organization in the United Kingdomthat has attempted to move school groundsto the top of the educational agenda. BillLucas, the director, describing the goals ofLTL, states that a school garden is asimportant for urban as for rural schools,“helping to bring about a betterunderstanding between town and country,”and a “keen power of observation in allthings alive.” LTL recognizes the importanceof gardening, through which children gainfirsthand experience with the seed-to-seedcycle, the rhythm and traditions of theharvest, and the taste, touch, and smell offruit, vegetables, and flowers.

In Africa, (Horst, Morna & Jonah, 1990)there has been little emphasis on practicalskills in the curriculum until recent years.The scenario is gradually changing withgardens being the main elements in Niger’snew educational policy and in Sierra Leone,where up to 80 percent of all schools havehands-on gardening classes. After gardeningin schools, children are more likely to helptheir parents farm at home, eager to showthem what they have learned. This developsprestige for farming in the minds of children.

The Impact of Garden-BasedLearning and School GardenPrograms

Garden-based learning programs have gainedpopularity across the internationaleducational landscape. Today there are manyprograms for both formal as well asnonformal education settings that emphasizenumerous strategies and goals for impact.Much of the literature on garden-basedprograms, however, has focused on practicalapproaches for starting and managing schoolgardens. Comparatively few studies havetraced the benefits of garden-based learningin the lives of children.

Proponents of children’s gardenprograms talk of the multiple developmentalbenefits that school gardens can have onchildren–namely, emotional, aesthetic, andeven spiritual in addition to the more obvioussocial and intellectual benefits, in a variety ofcontexts. For instance, The Master GardenerClassroom Garden Project provides inner-citychildren in the San Antonio IndependentSchool District with an experiential way oflearning about horticulture, gardening,themselves, and their relationships with theirpeers (Alexander, North & Hendren, 1995).The gardens are used as part of thecurriculum as well as a reward for hard workduring the day. An evaluation of the benefits

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Proponents of children’sgarden programs talk ofthe multiple developmentalbenefits that schoolgardens can have onchildren–namely,emotional, aesthetic, andeven spiritual in additionto the more obvious socialand intellectual benefits, ina variety of contexts.

PURPOSES OF SCHOOL GARDENS IN DEVELOPING AND DEVELOPED COUNTRIES

(Desmond, Grieshop, Subramaniam, in press):❧ to support core academic training, particularly in science and math

❧ to add a sense of excitement, adventure, emotional impact and aesthetic

appreciation to learning

❧ to teach basic skills and vocational competencies

❧ to teach about food and fiber production

❧ to teach ecological literacy and/or environmental education

❧ to teach sustainable development

❧ to produce food and other commodities for subsistence consumption and trade

❧ to improve nutrition, diet and health

of this project was conducted by collectingdata in the form of qualitative interviews ofsecond and third graders as well as parents,teachers, a master gardener, and a schoolprincipal. These interviews indicate that therewere many positive effects of working in thegarden. According to the researchers, thechildren had received lessons in moraldevelopment, enhanced their daily academiccurriculum, gained pleasure from watchingthe products of their labor flourish, and had achance to increase interactions with theirparents and other adults. In addition, thechildren learned the value of living things,plus the anger and frustration that occurswhen things of value are harmed out ofneglect or violence.

Priscilla Logan, educational consultantand permaculture instructor from Santa Fe,New Mexico, listed four reasons for usinggardens as a teaching method (Sealy, 2001):

1 High retention rate. When children workin gardens 90 percent of their experienceis classified as hands-on. A studyconducted by Bethel Learning Institutedocumented different student retentionrates based on teaching method, with 11percent retention for lectures, 75 percentfor learning by doing, and 90 percentwhen students teach other students.

2 Empowerment. A connection to theearth gives students a sense ofachievement and motivation.

3 Academics. Science, math, social studies,art, language, and many other subjectscan be taught using nature as thelearning laboratory, making theseconcepts more meaningful.

4 Teamwork. Facilitating cooperationand communication in a real worldsetting makes learning teamworkpossible; the class goal of a successfulgarden becomes more important thanindividual achievement.The literature in the area of garden-based

learning ranges from subjective accountsabout the importance of gardens in the formof self-reports, parents’ and teachers’ observa-tions as well more empirical assessments ofthe impact of school gardens.

Impact on Academic AchievementIn one well-evaluated study on experientialeducation, reported in Closing the

Achievement Gap: Using the Environment as anIntegrative Context for Learning (EIC,Lieberman & Hoody, 1998), 12 stateeducation agencies sought to identifysuccessful environment-based educationalprograms and conduct evaluations in variousdomain areas. The 40 successful programsthat use the EIC design share the basiceducational strategies of a multidisciplinaryapproach, hands-on learning experience,problem-solving, team teaching,individualized design, and an emphasis ondeveloping knowledge, understanding andappreciation for the environment. Thedocumented impacts of the programs were:

■ better performance on standardizedachievement tests of reading, writing,math, social studies and science

■ reduced classroom management anddiscipline problems

■ increased attention and enthusiasmfor learning

■ greater pride and ownership ofaccomplishments.

Impact on Environmental LiteracyGarden-based learning has been especiallybeneficial in environmental or ecologicalliteracy as well as in teaching scientificconcepts. According to the North CarolinaEnvironmental Education Plan (1995),hands-on experiences are the best way forstudents to develop an understanding of theircomplex world and their place in it. TheDown-to-Earth Program (DTE) aims toprovide this kind of learning with the help ofschool gardens as a knowledge building tool(Williamson & Smoak, 1999). The mainpurpose of the DTE program is to introduceyouth to sustainable agriculture andenvironmental education using the scientificmethod as a conceptual and hands-onlearning process that stresses criticalthinking, reasoning, and problem solving.Youth educators draw from a rich mixture ofmultidisciplinary topics such as agriculture,natural resources, environmentalmanagement, health and human safety, andhorticulture. The impact of the Down-to-Earth Program has been seen throughincreased knowledge of the scientific method,plants, fertilizer, and pests as well as positiveattitudinal and behavioral changes, increasedawareness, and facilitation of higher orderthinking processes.

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Garden-based learninghas been especiallybeneficial inenvironmental orecological literacyas well as in teachingscientific concepts.

With similar goals of achieving aninterdisciplinary approach to environmentaleducation, Project Green incorporates theschool garden and gardening activities intoall disciplines, including math, science,English, history, social studies, and art(Skelly & Zajicek, 1998). An evaluation ofthe project comparing experimental andcontrol groups found that children in theexperimental group, who participated inProject Green, had more positiveenvironmental attitudes, with second gradersshowing higher scores than fourth graders.More specifically, it showed that studentswho engaged in more outdoor relatedactivities reported more positiveenvironmental attitudes.

Programs such as the Life Lab ScienceProgram have created garden-based projectsfor learning science and connecting it to allareas of learning. Life Lab serves teachers inthe Monterey Bay Area and the Greater BayArea Regions, as well as throughout thenation. Their mission is to encourage respectfor life and the environment, appreciationand understanding of ecological systems, andenvironmental stewardship with the goal of asustainable future.

Impact on Children’s Health andNutritionSchool gardens have been used to teachchildren about nutrition and how to makehealthier food choices (Morris, Briggs, &Zidenberg-Sherr, 2000). Researchersemphasize the importance of nutritioneducation and the need to develop innovativemethods to motivate young children todevelop lifelong healthy eating habits. Theystate that school gardens serve as an idealcontext for nutritional programs. Researchdemonstrates that children who plant andharvest their own vegetables are more willingto taste and like them (Morris, Briggs, &Zidenberg-Sherr, 2000). In a garden projectcalled Nutrition in the Garden (Lineberger &Zajicek, 2000), teachers were guided tointegrate nutrition education as it relates tofruits and vegetables. Evaluations of studentsparticipating in the program showed thattheir attitudes toward fruits and vegetableshad become more favorable and they werealso more likely to choose fruits or vegetablesas snacks, compared to before they partici-pated in the gardening program.

In a garden project with similar goals,the impacts of the garden have led to morebenefits than the original aim of improvingnutrition and nutritional awareness inchildren (Canaris, 1995). Gardeningactivities enhanced the quality andmeaningfulness of children’s learning on awider level, with children communicatingwith their communities and parents as well aslearning mathematical and scientificprinciples in the garden.

Nutritional programs in the garden havebeen shown to have multiple benefits. TheNutrition Education and Training Section ofthe California Department of Educationstates five benefits of garden-based nutritioneducation (Sealy, 2001):

■ building bridges between school andcommunity,

■ promoting the transfer of informationfrom one generation to another,

■ developing environmental awarenessin students by caring for a livingenvironment,

■ providing opportunities for culturalexchange, and

■ building life skills.

Impacts on Families and CommunitiesThe Evergreen Elementary School in WestSacramento, California offered small gardenplots to families who were non-Englishspeaking immigrants, primarily from Hmongand Mien cultures, who rarely participated intheir children’s activities. A demonstrationgarden grew vegetables and other plantsfamiliar to the Hmong and Mien participants,thus encouraging participation by theparents. This project raised the self-esteem ofthe children as well as the non-Englishspeaking parents, who were then valuedas teachers.

Hands-on involvement in children’sdesigning, creating, caring for, and usingschool nature areas can help improvechildren’s academic performance as well asinculcate the willingness and capacity towork for the communities of which they are apart (Bell, 2001). In addition, teachers aregaining an appreciation for the potential ofschool ground projects that integratedisciplines, produce tangible outcomes andencourage children to build ties with theircommunities. “Lived experience” motivatesstudents and shapes their learning in lastingand personally significant ways.

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Researchers emphasize theimportance of nutritioneducation and the need todevelop innovative methodsto motivate young childrento develop lifelong healthyeating habits.

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For more information on current pedagogy, strategies, best practices,impacts, outcomes, and resources for garden-based learning, refer toDesmond, D., Grieshop, J. & Subramaniam, A. (in press).

AcknowledgmentsI would like to thank Dan Desmond and Martha Sealy for supplying mewith the materials for this article and Ramona Carlos and StephenRussell for their helpful comments and suggestions throughout.

Further study of the long-term influence of garden-based learning in the livesof children is needed tobetter understand its valueand impact.

Finally, garden-based learning maybecome an important approach for workingwith challenged populations of youth. Kaiser(1976) suggests that there are beneficialeffects of including a gardening program inthe school curriculum for emotionallydisturbed, autistic and mentally challengedchildren. Garden projects have beendemonstrated to have a positive impact for 12year olds with learning disabilities (Sarver,1985, in Hendren, 1999). As ArleneMarturano, coordinator of South CarolinaGarden-based Learning Networkaptly states, “all children can experiencesuccess in a school garden” (Marturano,1999, in Sealy, 2001).

ConclusionGarden-based learning has evolved throughthe ages, changing with the philosophies ofour education systems and the values of ourtimes. It is reasonable to expect that ourcurrent ideals of educating children throughan integrated curriculum, dealing with issuesrelevant today, and recognizing the uniquepotential of every child could be practicallyrealized through the stable establishment ofschool gardens. Further study of the long-term influence of garden-based learning inthe lives of children is needed to betterunderstand its value and impact. In thefuture, different ways to incorporate this formof learning may be explored in order to widenits scope and range in different contexts,whether in special education or as a strategyfor addressing learning disabilities. ■

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4-H Center for Youth DevelopmentDept. of Human and Community DevelopmentUniversity of CaliforniaOne Shields Avenue/3325 Hart HallDavis, CA 95616-8523

Phone (530) 754-8433Fax (530) 754-8440CYDdirector@ucdavis.eduhttp://fourhcyd.ucdavis.edu

■ Stephen T. Russell, Ph.D., Director■ Carolyn McCain, Publications Coordinator

Youth Civic Engagement: Membership and Mattering in Local CommunitiesThe Developmental Benefits of Nonformal Education and Youth DevelopmentApplying Resilience Theory to the Prevention of Adolescent Substance AbuseConnections Between 4-H and John Dewey’s Philosophy of EducationOrganizing Head, Heart, Hands & Health for Larger ServiceDisordered Eating Patterns Among AdolescentsCommunity CollaborationsEducation Beyond the WallsExperiential Education for Youth DevelopmentThe Greying of Rural AmericaResiliency and Assets: Understanding the Ecology of Youth DevelopmentRecruiting and Retaining VolunteersFifth Dimension and 4-HThe Education Community and the EconomyCurriculum Development for Nonformal EducationThe Biology of AdolescenceUnderstanding Adolescents’ Ethical BehaviorThe Value of Failure in Middle ChildhoodYouth ViolenceElements of Effective Community-based Youth ProgramsInfluences of Culture on Child DevelopmentChildren’s Cognition and LearningSocial Competence

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AARTI SUBRAMANIAM is a graduate research assistant at the 4-H Center for Youth Development anda graduate student in Human Development at the University of California, Davis.