Spring Explorations: Grow a Garden with Us! (Ages 4-10)

Does your child love to grow things and explore the outdoors? Interested in learning how to garden as a family? Join us this spring as we combine gardening and learning in a fun new program for homeschoolers and remote/hybrid learners. This unique, parent-led program will guide participants ages 4-10 through growing a spring and summer garden. Lessons combine gardening with science, math, English, art, social studies, and history. Families will receive fruit and vegetable transplants and/or seeds and planting instructions weekly. Many of the plants and seeds provided can also be grown in containers.

Beginning the week of May 3, participants can visit the Gardens’ Visitor Center at their convenience to pick up their first week’s activities and supplies (packed in accordance with CDC guidelines for COVID safety). Every week thereafter, new activities will be made available each Monday for a total of six weeks. Participants will receive a special bag in which to keep tools for investigation and discovery such as a magnifying glass, clipboard, journal, ruler, rain gauge, and a bug box.

In this hybrid program, activities at CMBG will include themed investigations, searches, surveys, scavenger hunts, and a flower dissection. At home, participants will have lessons to complete, games to play, experiments to perform, observations to record, art projects to create, plants and seeds to start, and weekly book recommendations. As this program targets ages 4-10, we will provide a variety of lessons and activities suiting the learning level of every child.

Need more flexibility? Not a problem. Choosing a later start-date, condensing the program into fewer weeks, or picking up more than one week’s worth of activities at a time are all options.

Weekly topics include:

• Week 1: Planning a garden
• Week 2: Plant parts and life cycles
• Week 3: Gardening for pollinators
• Week 4: Plant adaptations
• Week 5: Five senses gardening
• Week 6: Decomposers/composting

Families with multiple children participating will receive one 6-pack of certain vegetable plants, such as tomatoes and peppers, for all children to share. Each child, however, will receive their own seed packets as well as some varieties of flower and vegetable seedlings. If extra plants become available during the course of the program, they will be made available to participating families at a low cost.

If you participated in our program last year and do not need the backpack filled with tools for investigation, please call 207-633-8000 to register and receive a $5.00 discount.

The cost of this program includes complimentary Gardens admission for one adult and every child registered once a week. Additional adults will need to purchase an admission ticket in advance of their visit. Families participating in Spring Explorations are eligible to receive a 50% discount on a family membership (a savings of $50.00). Lincoln County residents may also eligible for membership scholarships. Please contact Betsy Angelico at 207-633-8013 to purchase a membership or to learn more. Families who register more than one child for this program will receive a discount at checkout.