Growing up in a small coastal town, students spend a great deal of time outdoors and at the beach. Given the many learning opportunities that such an environment can provide, engaging students in a sustained, environmental service project seemed like a natural complement to lessons focusing on the interaction of organisms within a habitat. This…

The aim of this study is to present the details of a practice that is carried out within the scope of Community Service Practices Course from a scientific perspective. And also to investigate the views of the pre-service teachers related to the topic. Research design is determined as a case study method. For the data collection, interview method…

Agricultural systems are complex and can be used as examples to teach science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) concepts. However, inclusion of agriculture in core STEM courses is often limited. Three professional development sessions for K-12 teachers were offered in 2021-2022 (hybrid or remote sessions) and repeated in 2022-2023…

In recent years, many schools have taken up food gardening. This is a welcome trend, but it has had to be conducted as an extracurricular activity, often with the help of, or run by, parents and grandparents. Growing vegetables and fruit, if it is to be done well, is a complex activity. The potential good outcomes for health, learning, and…

Many scholars and practitioners have asserted the value of opportunities for young children to participate in projects that inspire positive civic engagement. A National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) Position statement stresses civic engagement as an important focus for powerful and purposeful learning in elementary social studies. The…

School gardens are ideal places for students to ask and answer questions about science. This paper describes a case study of two 3rd grade teachers and two STEM coordinators who were recruited to implement and evaluate a horticultural-based curriculum developed for this study. Informed by the Teacher-Centered Systemic Reform model we conducted a…

The STEM team at the University of Worcester support STEM activities in schools in Herefordshire and Worcestershire. Part of this help includes suggesting activities for STEM clubs. As the biologist on the team author, Sue Howarth was asked by teachers for ideas to use in biology clubs. This article was prompted by feedback that these ideas might…

This article describes the author's personal experiences leading primary grades in whole-class composing. Together they created songs inspired by topics the students were exploring in their homeroom classes. The author systematically describes the songwriting process they employed, identifying specific challenges encountered along the way. The…

Community gardening provides many benefits for students like outdoor physical activity, an understanding of plant life cycles, food production and healthy eating (Blair, 2009; Whiren, 1995). Gardening also provides hands-on learning opportunities to draw parallels between what is needed for plants to grow and what students need to be healthy. When…

Although educators widely use school gardens for experiential education, researchers have not systematically examined the evaluative literature on school-gardening outcomes. The author reviewed the U.S. literature on children's gardening, taking into account potential effects, school-gardening outcomes, teacher evaluations of gardens as learning…

This article summarizes a 2000 study of school garden programs and their variation and the impact of such variation on 427 third-grade students' sense of responsibility and attitudes toward science and the environment. A teacher questionnaire was developed to gain insight into how teachers use school gardens with their students and in their…

At the start of each school year at Oil City Elementary Magnet School in Oil City, Louisiana, eager students ask, "What's our theme this year?" This curiosity comes from their expectations that they will study a different environmental concept each year. Kindergarten classes learn to "Be a Friend to the Earth," followed by life…

A Clemson University introductory landscape design class collaborated with South Carolina Botanical Gardens (SCBG) staff and coordinators of Sprouting Wings to design an exploratory Children's Garden within the SCBG. Service learning provides students with invaluable real-world experiences solving problems and interacting with clients while…

In this investigation, pairs of upper elementary students test germination percentage using seeds of Indian corn ("Zea mays"), scarlet runner beans ("Phaseolus coccineus"), and the prairie cup-plant ("Silphium perfoliatum") grown on rolled, damp paper towels. The pairs compare seeds that have been stratified, a simulation of overwintering and…

Since many decades Education Science and Technology has an achieved tremendous recognition and has been applied to variety of disciplines, mainly Curriculum development, methodology to develop e-learning systems and education management. Many efforts have been taken to improve knowledge of students, researchers, educationists in the field of…