Teachers say successful preschool gardens require additional space, time, financial support, and collaborationMost studies of school gardening practices have focused on primary and secondary schools—not preschools. This small-scale qualitative study examined semi-structured interviews with Turkish preschool educators to understand their views on school gardens in their curriculum. Teachers’ perspectives affect their participation in nature-based programs and their teaching practices. Therefore, better understanding their views on school gardening can help build preschool teachers’ support of and participation in school gardening programs.
The researchers adopted a basic qualitative design to gauge how preschool teachers in a Turkish city made sense of their experiences with their schools’ gardening programs. They interviewed a principal and teacher from regular preschools and nature preschools, asking 23 questions related to how they defined school gardening, what gardening activities they implemented, how these activities impacted their students, and what problems they faced in implementing garden-based learning. Their deductive data analysis then grouped responses thematically to understand teachers’ opinions and teaching practices.
In these four Turkish preschools, gardening programs mostly consisted of outdoor activities in school gardens and hobby gardens, greenhouse activities, and supplemental in-class activities. Activities included planting, harvesting, and composting. In some cases, educators integrated garden activities with their art, mathematics, and science curricula. From teachers’ and principals’ perspectives, school gardening activities had many positive effects for city children with limited nature experience, especially motor, cognitive, and language development. Likewise, they observed young children developing positive social skills—responsibility, cooperation, observation, and sharing—as well as a love of nature and knowledge of ecosystems and the sustainability of natural resources. At the same time, they named several barriers to garden-based learning, such as the need for smaller class sizes and additional space, time, financial support, support staff, and collaborations with experts.
Given the study’s small sample, its thematic findings are not generalizable. However, the researchers argued that these educators’ opinions on their schools’ gardening practices can inform other schools’ gardening practices. To improve preschool teachers’ participation in garden-based learning, for example, schools might stress the positive effects of school gardening programs. In particular, teachers valued the perceived emotional benefits of gardening activities, appreciating how children seemed happier and calmer in outdoor environments. At the same time, the authors stress seeing school gardening programs more contextually. That is, the availability of space, time, and financial support were necessary to implement a successful school gardening program. Specifically, educators stressed the importance of a dedicated gardening space large enough for a full class of students, smaller class sizes, more teacher training and planning time, parental support, additional support staff to maintain the garden, and collaboration with other community stakeholders to be effective. These considerations may be fundamental steps toward improving the experiential quality of garden-based learning in early childhood education.
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