Brooklyn Botanic Garden--home of the oldest continuously operating children's garden in North America--offers a groundbreaking handbook that helps parents, teachers, and community gardeners introduce kids to the pleasures of gardening. In addition to growing common plants from seed, children will become more aware of nature's cycles and earth's ecology, and enjoy a variety of fun projects.

How do you make a garden grow? In this playful companion to the popular Tap the Magic Tree and Touch the Brightest Star, you will see how tiny seeds bloom into beautiful flowers. And by tapping, clapping, waving, and more, young readers can join in the action! Christie Matheson masterfully combines the wonder of the natural world with the interactivity of reading. Beautiful collage-and-watercolor art follows the seed through its entire life cycle, as it grows into a zinnia in a garden full of buzzing bees, curious hummingbirds, and colorful butterflies. Children engage with the book as they wiggle their fingers to water the seeds, clap to make the sun shine after rain, and shoo away a hungry snail. Appropriate for even the youngest child, Plant the Tiny Seed is never the same book twice—no matter how many times you read it! And for curious young nature lovers, a page of facts about seeds, flowers, and the insects and animals featured in the book is included at the end. Fans of Press Here, Eric Carle, and Lois Ehlert will find their next favorite book in Plant the Tiny Seed.

This updated how-to resource guides teachers—with or without green thumbs—through the rich learning opportunities found in gardening with children.

Laugh and learn with fun facts about flowers, plants, fruit, and more—all told in Dr. Seuss’s beloved rhyming style and starring the Cat in the Hat! “I’m the Cat in the Hat, and I think that you need to come take a look at this thing called a seed.” The Cat in the Hat’s Learning Library series combines beloved characters, engaging rhymes, and Seussian illustrations to introduce children to non-fiction topics from the real world! Grow your brain with fun facts about flowering plants and learn: how they all start out as a seed how they make their own food inside their leaves how bees help spread the pollen flowers need to produce fruit and much more! Perfect for story time and for the youngest readers, Oh Say Can You Seed? All About Flowering Plants also includes an index, glossary, and suggestions for further learning. Look for more books in the Cat in the Hat’s Learning Library series! High? Low? Where Did It Go? All About Animal Camouflage Is a Camel a Mammal? All About Mammals The 100 Hats of the Cat in the Hat: A Celebration of the 100th Day of School A Great Day for Pup: All About Wild Babies Would You Rather Be a Pollywog? All About Pond Life Happy Pi Day to You! All About Measuring Circles I Can Name 50 Trees Today! All About Trees Fine Feathered Friends: All About Birds My, Oh My--A Butterfly! All About Butterflies Inside Your Outside! All About the Human Body Ice is Nice! All About the North and South Poles

“What better way to begin to explore the natural world than to experience the magic and beauty of a family garden.” —Arden Bucklin-Sporer, author of How to Grow a School Garden Many gardeners find that once they have children gardening goes the way of late-night dinner parties and Sunday morning sleep-ins. Raising kids and maintaining a garden can be a juggling act, leaving the family garden forgotten and neglected. But kids can make great gardening companions, and the benefits of including them are impossible to ignore. Gardening gets kids outdoors and away from television and video games, increases their connection to plants and animals, and helps build enthusiasm for fresh fruits and vegetables. Their involvement becomes the real harvest of a family garden. In The Book of Gardening Projects for Kids, Whitney Cohen and John Fisher draw on years of experience in the Life Lab Garden Classroom and gardening with their own children to teach parents how to integrate the garden into their family life, no matter its scope or scale. The book features simple, practical gardening advice, including how to design a play-friendly garden, ideas for fun-filled theme gardens, and how to cook and preserve the garden's bounty. 101 engaging, family-friendly garden activities are also featured, from making Crunch-n-Munch Vegetable Beds and Muddy Miniature Masterpieces to harvesting berries for Fresh Fruity Pops.

Winner of the American Horticultural Therapy Association's Book Publication Award 2014 A garden or nature setting presents the perfect opportunity for children with Autism Spectrum Disorders and special needs to learn, play and strengthen body and mind. This book empowers teachers and parents with little gardening know-how to get outside and use nature to motivate young learners. Using a mindfulness approach, Natasha Etherington presents a simple gardening program that offers learning experiences beyond those a special needs student can gain within the classroom. The book outlines the many positive physical, cognitive, sensory, emotional and social benefits of getting out into the garden and provides specially adapted gardening activities for a variety of needs, including those with developmental disabilities and behavioural difficulties, as well as wheelchair users. With a focus on the therapeutic potential of nature, the book shows that gardening can help reduce feelings of anxiety, provide an outlet for physical aggression, build self-esteem through the nurturing of plants and much more. With this practical program, teachers and parents can easily adopt gardening activities into their schedules and enjoy the benefits of introducing children with special needs to nature and the rhythms of the seasons.

So begins this lyrical tribute to the bugs, bees, and birds that make the garden such a busy place. With each turned page, more visitors appear, and all the while the “surprise”—a chrysalis—changes unnoticed until, on the last page, a butterfly emerges and flies away across the garden’s well-tended borders. Back-of-book notes about the natural histories of the garden’s denizens complete this lovely and lively portrait of backyard nature, which is also a gentle meditation on the rewards of paying attention. A chipmunk hides on every page to divert and engage young readers.Fountas & Pinnell Level O This is my busy green garden. There’s a surprise In clever disguise, That hangs in my busy green garden. This is a ladybug dawdling so, Near the surprise, in clever disguise, That hangs in my busy green garden. This is a honeybee buzzing below The red spotted ladybug dawdling so, Near the surprise, in clever disguise, That hangs in my busy green garden.