When it comes to math, there’s practical everyday math, then there’s everything you learn in school in your math class. While there is overlap, it’s sometimes hard to make the leap from a math worksheet on fractions to baking a batch of cookie and choosing to cut the recipe in half or double it. Equally it’s hard to make the leap from your percents worksheets, to calculating your final cost (plus tax) of a T-Shirt marked $14.99 with 40% and 8% sales tax. Or making the leap from your decimals worksheet to converting quarters to dollars. We encounter math daily and often what we learn in class takes years to master in real life. Math in the Garden is a brilliant book that takes the math class to the garden or other hands on activities and brings math to life in a relevant, practical and educational way.
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Watercoloring Nature Journal Cover
While putting together our nature units for the spring, we decided to include the book called Math In The Garden. This delightful book has garden projects that center around different math concepts. The books is beautifully done and is very complete offering a variety of math concepts from ages 5-13 as well as a list of state standards the projects will meet for quick reference. The first project is a nature journal for the child to record the projects he will do throughout the book. Instead of using cardstock, we decided to watercolor dandelions on 90lb. Fabriano watercolor paper available at Dick Blick. This project took about 30-60 minutes to complete and is suitable for KG-8th grade. I love the way the art turned out and I love the nature journal even more!
For this project, you will need watercolor paper, pencil, eraser, watercolors and an image to copy. We also made our fully bloomed dandelion using embossing powder for a fun resist look. For this you will need a Zig embossing pen, white embossing powder, and a heat gun. Additionally, you can finish off the dandelion with glitter glue. Most items can be found at local crafts stores. The cost of this project is minimal if you already have the tools. However, for simple watercoloring project, you can do this for less than a dollar per student. For our watercolors, we are using Tim Holtz Distress inks by Ranger in an assortment of yellow and greens: Shabby Shutters, Peeled Paint, Crushed Olive, Bundled Sage, Forest Moss, Wild Honey and Scattered Straw.
Nature Journal
The first project of the book is how to make your own Garden Journal. The book recommends using cardstock for the front cover, but we decided to watercolor a spring nature scene of dandelions in bloom, and we are so happy with the result.
For this project you will need: Cardstock for the cover or watercolor paper Twig or stick the width of your paper Drawing paper (8-10 sheets) A hole punch Rubber band or twine Optionally: a score board.
Directions: Hole punch the top of all your papers including the front cover in the same spot. Score the top of your papers at 3/4 of inch (optional) for easy folding. Tie twine around your twig and thread it through the hole. Repeat at each hole and tie off the end.
Learning to Estimate in the Garden
Our Botany main lesson block for our Waldorf homeschool has been expanded to include a plants and trees unit study. For this unit, we added the book Math In The Garden published by Kids in the Garden.org . This book comes with several math lessons you can do while in the garden. The book is designed for ages 5-13, and it’s packed with activities ranging from estimation, counting, area, and patterns all the way up to algebra. It’s written in a way that inspired living math concepts through graden and hands-on work. So far we love this book and think it’s very well done.
Learning about Ratios in the Garden
We are working through the book Math In The Garden, and finding a lot of inspiration for math activities from this book. It is designed to integrate math with gardening and does so beautifully with innovative lessons that are explained well and enhanced with delightful illustrations. Today, we are working on Ratios of Shoots and Roots, an activity for children 8-13 years of age. What I like about this book is that each lessons comes with multiple ways to approach the lesson or comes with various activities. You could complete them all or choose what suits you students, or you could use the book as inspiration and depart completely from the activities and design your own lessons and activities based on the information provided in the book.
How to Find Area and Perimeter
There are many practical ways to learn about area and perimeter, and while I think starting with a square or rectangle is advisable as an introduction, once the student has learned how to measure and calculate the area and perimeter of their room or home, I think moving to the garden to measure and calculate perimeter and area of leaves is a fabulous hands-on idea.
Length, Circumference, Median, and Mean
We are making our way through the Math in the Garden Book and exploring Length, circumference, median and mean. We gathered an assortment of fruits and found that we have spring and summer fruits, but we can do this in the fall and winter as well with pomegranates, persimmons, and butternut squash.
Finding Symmetry
Find symmetry with Math in the Garden was one of the easiest more practical demonstration for finding symmetry. I loved this one so much. Be sure to use clean hands and have a clean space so you may use the fruits and veggies for a salad.
Graphing Plant Growth
This was one project that took time to complete as we needed to wait for our seedling to grow. You may consider using fast growing beans and complete this project within 1-2 weeks.