OT: Encouraging Children

Hi

A few weeks ago iris-talk was discussing how to encourage children into
gardening and we were planning to give away irises to children at a field day.

To follow up -the children's trail organisers (a local primary school) also
gave all the participating stall holders something to give away and we choose
apples, rather than lollies etc. So every child, who paid to take part in the
trail and visited our site got an apple, a spuria iris with cultural notes
and, of course, a flyer about our business. We ended up giving out almost 600
plants and the really lovely part was that there was only one child (early
teens) that sounded less than thrilled to be given a plant. Many of the
children sounded really excited to receive it and a lot had their own gardens
already.
In case we are accused of excessive generosity, the Spurias came from a patch
labelled "Misc - mixed" so it was a good way to find a home for them.

I think it is easier to encourage country children than city children, I get
very depressed when I see children growing up in apartments etc with no
relationship to the soil and how food is grown etc

PS do you have Field Days in the USA? they are giant annual agricultural
exhibits over 2-4 days, no competitions of stock etc, really just big trade
shows of all things rural, from clothing to harvesters, What are they called
in the US?

Colleen Modra
Adelaide Hills
South Australia

colleen@impressiveirises.com.au
www.impressiveirises.com.au

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