Learn about planting, growing, nurturing and harvesting plants in the classroom and find out all about commercial plant growers. This Complete Series of five lessons is packed with information and resources to help you successfully grow plants in a short amount of time with your class, regardless of whether or not you have previous gardening experience. There are detailed lesson plans with a choice of differentiated learning activities, slideshow presentations for each lesson, and a range of printable resources including detailed teacher's notes to help you prepare for these fun, practical Key Stage One Science lessons.

Each of the five lessons have been designed to encourage your class to work scientifically by observing, using equipment and special vocabulary, and by asking and answering questions about growing plants. By the end of this Complete Series of lessons, all your children will be green-fingered garden gurus!

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Starting to grow

What do plants need to start growing? Why do we, and commercial growers, plant and grow plants when they grow naturally in the wild? Children will consider these questions as they learn about the things some plants need to germinate, and what they continue to need as they grow. The included slides and worksheets even provide a straightforward way for young learners to plan a simple, comparative, fair test.

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Nurturing young plants

Take a closer look at the things plants need to survive and grow once they've germinated. Children will find out about the importance of soil, water, light and air. They'll then either examine young seedlings which they've grown themselves, or identify appropriate locations around school with the right conditions in which different plants might grow well.

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Dying and re-growing plants

Get children thinking about the things they can observe in animals which show they are living. Can we observe all these processes in all living things? The included slides explain how some life processes are hard to observe, and how they occur in plants. After that, there's a choice of activities where your class may either plant and re-grow fruit or vegetable 'scraps', or go on a detective hunt for dead and dying plants around school.

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Harvesting mature plants

How do plants get more of the things they need as they grow? Children will find out all about how plants grow and 'move' to find more light, space, water and nutrients as well as consider how and why plant growers give plants the things they need to reach maturity. After that, there's a wide variety of activities included, where children will care for plants they've grown themselves or learn more about the continuing growth of young plants.

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Reaching maturity

In the final lesson of this Complete Series, children will find out more about how mature plants can produce fruits containing seeds, and how they — and commercial plant growers — can harvest mature plants. They'll even consider how plants grown at home can be harvested in a way that allows them to re-grow and produce more edible fruits or leaves! After that they can either harvest and even taste some of the plants they've grown, or go hunting for 'proof' of mature plants producing fruits and seeds in an outside space.

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