Get your grown-ups growing

The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), with the help of TV gardening guru Alan Titchmarsh, is calling on all schools to get their grown-ups growing as part of a nationwide event to be held across October.

Get Your Grown-ups Growing forms part of the RHS’ Campaign for School Gardening, supported by Waitrose – a national initiative that encourages schools to create gardens, teach the skills of growing, and in turn enable their pupils to learn outside the classroom. Each October schools are invited to hold a Grown-ups Growing event so they can involve their local community to help develop the school garden.

Alan Titchmarsh, leading supporter of the RHS Campaign for School Gardening and its Get Your Grown-ups Growing event, explains, “It is no secret that school was never my favourite place and my interests lay outside the classroom, often in the allotment with my grandfather. But today it’s a very different world.

“The fact that schools have really cottoned onto the benefits of gardening with their pupils is fantastic news, especially for children who are looking for different ways to learn, like I was. If we can encourage parents and the wider community to get involved with their school garden, then who knows, we might end up with a green revolution both at home and at school.”

Entering its third year, Get Your Grown-ups Growing has developed from a small pilot project based in Yorkshire, to a national success involving a thousand schools. Of the schools that held an event last year, 74% said it had increased their children’s interest in gardening, while over half reported an increase in adult support and adult interest in gardening.

Jacky Chave, Strategic Schools Manager, RHS, said, “Having a school garden is a fantastic asset for teachers and pupils as it provides a multitude of learning opportunities, but we know it can take a lot of hard work to maintain. By involving parents and other local adults, through an event like Get Your Grown-ups Growing, we hope that school gardens will be looked after all year round, and enthusiasm for gardening and growing will spread beyond the school gates and into children’s homes.”

The RHS hopes to see 2,000 schools register for this year’s Get Your Grown-ups Growing event, double last year’s figure. All registered schools will be entered into a free prize draw to win garden tools and materials.

To register to take part in this year’s event, held in October 2011, schools must sign up to the RHS Campaign for School Gardening via www.rhs.org.uk/schoolgardening and click on the ‘Get Your Grown-ups Growing’ button featured in the menu on the home page. Schools must register to receive a free support pack; including seeds, event ideas, information templates, stickers and much more. Each individual school can choose any date in October to hold its event and organise activities to suit its requirements.