The garden classroom

To sow the seeds of healthy habits and cultivate a positive relationship with fresh food and gardening, the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation supports kitchen gardens in schools and early learning services across Australia.

With a vision to encourage children’s health and create sustainable communities, the foundation provides over 1,000 schools and early childhood services across the country with invaluable access to extensive resources, professional development and ongoing support to create thriving kitchen garden programs. Through these programs, students are given the opportunity to witness firsthand the transformative power of nurturing plants from seed to harvest, and enjoy fresh, seasonal and delicious produce.

By promoting a deeper understanding of food sources through fun, hands-on learning, the foundation is supporting communities and educators to deliver pleasurable food education.

Start small, dream big

As a not-for-profit that values inclusivity, we work to make the Kitchen Garden Program accessible to all. Schools and services don’t need large tracts of land or industrial kitchens; successful kitchen garden programs can be set up and sustained anywhere on any budget.

Kitchen gardens come in all shapes and sizes. Some may be extensive plots of land with a variety of produce, while others might be a handful of herbs along a windowsill. Our ethos is start small and dream big.

Kitchen gardens do not have to be expensive. As one educator put it, “Your setting and available resources will shape what your program looks like and how it will evolve over time.” The kitchen garden team works with schools and services to provide one-on-one support tailored to their unique setting.

Provided with the program’s abundant resources and part of a ‘community of practice’, every program member has access to activities, tips and tricks, and can learn from the successes and challenges shared by other educators.

Our programs also encourage community engagement. Through multi-generational volunteering, market stalls offering cheap produce to the community, collaborations with men’s sheds and working bees, with the right support, even the smallest of seeds can grow into something mighty.

Improving health outcomes through positive exposure

The foundation takes a preventative approach to wellbeing, supporting communities and working with children and young people to address preventable health challenges early.

Our programs offer regular positive exposure to fresh produce, which increases familiarity and influences positive acceptance and taste preference towards healthier foods. A study by BMC Public Health found that, “School is regarded as a prime setting to shape children’s dietary behaviour,” and that the circular learning environment created through a hands-on experimental approach “may strengthen the impact of nutrition education on children.”

Kitchen gardens work to address inequities in access to fresh produce. Growing produce increases school and home accessibility and availability, further enabling children and young people to prepare and eat more fruit and vegetables, including novel foods they may otherwise have not had access to.

The program has the potential of reducing children’s reluctance to consume novel foods with students being supported to discover new produce and flavours, such as natives like midyim berries and river mint, which also serves to grow conversations about Indigenous and other cultures.

Wellbeing in the garden

Diggers readers know the value of time in the garden for mental health. Members of  our program have also found significant emotional and physical benefits for both students and educators.

Kerrilee Kimber from Gippsland Complete Health says, “There are so many mindful and awareness-building moments with a Kitchen Garden Program…It gets kids in touch with their bodies and senses, and out of their mind, their worries and anxieties. It takes them away from preconceived ideas about what the classroom holds for them that day.

“And the physicality of it. Physically moving is a huge aspect of wellbeing. It’s about calming the mind, getting it all out through the body. Moving, smelling, tasting puts us in touch with our senses, and that’s totally what the program is all about.”

The Kitchen Garden Program is an accessible and cost-effective measure for empowering children and young people to learn about investing in their own health, and the health of the planet, through time in the garden.

Written by Natasha Grogan, kitchen garden program manager, Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation.