George
Washington-First President, First Gardener
“Liberty, when it begins to take root is a plant of rapid
growth.” This is just one quote from George Washington that references his love
of gardening. Not only was he our first
president, George Washington was also a very avid agriculturalist. He loved to read and learn about things and
he was fascinated with improving the productivity of his home gardens. George Washington was known to experiment
with plants to try to improve the yield of their produce. His love for plants is very evident in the
gardens at his home in Mount Vernon.
George Washington took great pride in his gardens and not only designed
them to be productive but to also be very aesthetically pleasing. He really enjoyed watching the process of
plants growing from seed to adult. He
said, "Bad seed is a robbery
of the worst kind: for your pocket-book not only suffers by it, but your
preparations are lost and a season passes away unimproved." (Content)
Students will be able to examine images of George
Washington’s gardens on the web site http://www.mountvernon.org/visit-his-estate/general-information, as well as pictures from the book “George
Washington’ s Mount Vernon “.
As a group we will talk about plants. (standard, PA Science
3.1.2.A3, 3.1.2.A5, 3.1.2.B6, Writing CC1.4.2.A We will review the
different parts of a plant and how they grow.
(DOK1) We will discuss the importance of
plants. (DOK2) We will discuss how important plants
and gardens were in George Washington’s time when markets were not as readily
available, and students will give examples of foods they could not have if they
weren’t grown in the home garden. (DOK3) Students
are asked to create scenarios of what would have happened if Mount Vernon
didn’t have such expansive and successful gardens. (DOK4)
Students will plant and water seeds. Students will get a choice of peas, beans,
marigolds, and daisy seeds. Students
will monitor and record the progress of their plants daily in a plant
journal. After the plants have grown to
develop mature parts, students will draw a picture of their plant and label the
various parts. (Creative
Activity)
Domain 1a, 1b, 1c, 1d, 2a, 2b, 2e,
3a, 3b, 3c, 3e
Do you know the book Beyond the Bean Seed: Gardening Activities for Grades K-6? I have that one in the MS (it's mine) and you might want to check out some of the other suggestions.
ReplyDeleteI love the learning across the disciplines--history and science...fantastic concepts!
ReplyDeleteI have some photos of the various gardens at Mount Vernon which I took last fall if you'd like them. If you visit during the growing season, the garden/landscape tour is excellent.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that might be interesting to the students is to point out the combination of decorative plants around the edge but vegetables growing in the middle of the upper garden. Why waste the space on something pretty that no one will see, when they could use the space for food.
Also a good introduction to the idea of "in season" and where food in the grocery store comes from!