Inspiring the next generation of organic growers
Growing Up Organic (GUO) is an in school, curriculum connected, hands-on program that teaches children and youth about organic agriculture, healthy nutrition, and environmental issues. The GUO program has been active since 2007 and in this time we have delivered thousands of hands-on, curriculum-linked workshops to over 10,000 students and directly facilitated garden-builds at over 130+ schools in Ottawa, Ontario.
By providing hands-on learning in school gardens, GUO empowers children and youth to develop essential food literacy skills, cultivate lifelong healthy eating habits, enhance practical food skills, gain food growing skills and a deeper understanding of both local and global environmental issues. Through our education-focused approach, we aim to inspire the next generation to make informed, responsible choices for their health and the planet.
GUO partners with school boards to support the establishment of school garden programs as the basis for experiential education at all grade levels. We provide educators with the essential tools to start these initiatives with confidence and ongoing support. Our garden-based workshops, delivered on-site at school gardens, provide teachers with building blocks and a model for integrating hands-on food literacy into their pedagogy.
Why Start a School Garden?
In the past few decades, Canada has seen a dramatic increase in interest around school gardens and nutrition. With federal and provincial policy shifts for wellness in Canada, Ottawa is part of a larger movement of communities across the world pursuing outdoor and garden-based education.
The growth of garden and farm-based education is due in part to the resurgence of experiential education models, but is largely a reflection of the intrinsic potential for learning in living classrooms. School gardens and food literacy provide countless benefits academically, ecologically and socially. In the garden, students naturally explore relationships and systems—such as ecosystems, food systems, and decomposition. This hands-on experience not only helps them uncover potential careers in agriculture and sustainability, but also provides first hand insights into the pressing environmental and societal challenges of their generation.
Regardless of the age or subject of study, the garden provides a platform for interdisciplinary learning with long-term enhancement in all fields, especially science and math. Gardens provide a hands-on environment for applying many classroom lessons and more importantly, they provide a context where students can connect disciplines that are traditionally fragmented within the curriculum. The results are students with healthier eating habits, cooperative abilities, social skills and academic achievement.
The garden is a master teacher of responsibility and decision making. In taking responsibility for a living, growing ecosystem that will endure past one class, students begin to co-create their classroom. In this way garden-based learning goes beyond general experiential learning as it takes place in a very intentional, ever-changing environment. While the garden transforms so do the students, emotionally, socially and academically.
Why Organic?
Organic production is important as an entry point for instilling a lifelong sense of environmental responsibility and respect for the planet. Given the urgency of today’s environmental challenges, we see an especially pressing need to incorporate environmental education in this manner in the school environment. Food is a uniquely powerful entry point for starting to think about how our daily actions and consumption practices affect the earth. Once students start to care for their school garden, they begin to care more about their own backyard, in the largest sense of the word.
There are many other reasons and benefits to growing organically, but with GUO’s strategic focus on children and youth, this is especially significant. Children are at particular risk from chemical pesticide exposure through their diets because they consume more food per kilogram of body mass than adults. Children are also more vulnerable to the effects of these chemicals because their internal organs are still developing and maturing and their enzymatic, metabolic, and immune systems may provide less natural protection than those of an adult. COG wants to steward the next generation of healthy, happy, and environmentally attuned Canadians by inspiring future organic growers and fostering a deep connection to organic agriculture.
GUO Delivers
GUO’s Impact
Each school year, our team works with partner schools to deliver our educational program and garden services. COG’s goal is to work with teachers to inspire the next generation to care about the food they eat. We do this by providing an understanding and appreciation of where food comes from, how it’s grown and who grows it so that students recognize how food reaches their plates.
During the 2023-2024 school year, our GUO program was delivered in the Ottawa, ON region, providing our services to:
- Over 2,100 students aged 5-18
- 30+ schools and 2 school boards
- 90+ distinct classes, including 4 special needs classes
In the 2023-2024 school year, the GUO program lead 450 hands-on workshops in our partner schools including: garden building, garlic planting, planning the garden, direct seeding, transplanting and healthy soils. Our workshops successfully link school gardens to science and technology curriculum while allowing students to experience growing, caring for, harvesting and consuming healthy, fresh, organic produce at school.
With the help of the RBC Foundation, students were able to connect with local farmers in their classroom and on the farm this year. GUO took our high school aged students on a field trip in May 2024 to local organic and regenerative farms in the Ottawa area.
Students were able to learn about the eco-friendly techniques our farmers are using to feed our communities while lowering their carbon footprint, what practices like organic and regenerative mean, and what kind of career opportunities are available in the agriculture sector.
Interested in garden based education at your school?
GUO welcomes new school boards, schools and individual teachers to connect with us. We will work with you to answer any questions about the program, eligibility and enrolment. Please complete the interest form via the button below and we will be in touch with next steps.
This program is possible thanks to the generous support of our Partners:
