From Classroom To Garden: Integrating Flower Fundraising Into The Classroom Curriculum

Incorporating Plant Fundraisers into Curriculum

By selling flowers and other plant life kids are exposed to a field of education that may be new to them. Involving the students in the fundraising efforts gives them additional context which opens up learning opportunities. When a teacher incorporates gardening into the curriculum students can further engage with their education. Whether or not your school has a school garden, by teaching kids about plant life and providing an education with gardening basics it provides a foundation for them to continue learning and starting their own garden. Flowers and plants can be incorporated in many ways including through science courses, school gardens, classroom discussions, and having students engage together in flower fundraisers. Continue reading to learn more about how schools can incorporate flower fundraising and gardening into the classroom, and what learning opportunities it provides.

Integrating Fundraising and Life Skills

One unique aspect of schools involving students in fundraising efforts is the added bonus of teaching life skills. Through fundraising, students will continue learning outside of the classroom. Students can learn from fundraising organizers how to engage with potential customers, how sales transactions work, and how to help with community organizing. Not only do children get to participate in the fundraising, but they are able to see where funding for special programs comes from and can see the direct result of their hard work. With the help of a teacher, a fundraising event can give students volunteer opportunities providing additional resources for their education and curriculum. In order to expand extracurricular programs such as band, theater, or garden programs, coming together to raise funding is a profound learning opportunity and an excellent way for a teacher and parents to help students learn valuable life skills.

Teaching Community Engagement At Your School

Community engagement is an extremely valuable experience schools can pass on to younger generations. Providing students with an opportunity to help their teacher raise funding for programs in their schools teaches community engagement inside and outside of the classroom. A thorough curriculum not only provides students with the basics of gardening but also an education on how to engage with the community around them. A teacher can provide many realistic examples and exercises for students outside of the classroom and give them the opportunity to make a difference in their own local community. By selling plant and flower arrangements students will be learning the direct impact their actions have and learn how they can help fund the programs they’re a part of.

Teaching Students How to Lead

Schools that provide leadership opportunities give students the chance to step up and make a difference. Without opportunities to lead students may not have access to these learning moments. When students can engage with their community outside of their standard curriculum and outside of the classroom they are engaging with their education in a completely new and exciting way. Learning about fundraising, raising funds for their school garden or other programs, and handling merchandise, sales, and customers are all great learning opportunities. Schools can give their students the unique opportunity to learn these skills and to step up and lead their peers. With chances to lead during fundraising students can step into a leadership role and learn valuable skills beyond a standard education.

Incorporate The Economics of Investing in Fundraisers

There are a lot of great learning experiences that can come from flower fundraising. Schools that involve their students in fundraising efforts can expand the learning experiences beyond the standard curriculum. By presenting the figures and breaking down the cost of everything needed to orchestrate the fundraising event students can spend their time outside of the classroom learning about the finances of funding events and school programs. Not only can students get exposure to handling sales transactions, but they will gain a sense of how finances work outside of the classroom. These concepts can be included in the curriculum that schools use while they’re working to raise funds for special programming.

Integration of Plant Fundraising and School Gardens

Flower fundraisers provide a great chance to incorporate plant life into the school curriculum. Regardless of whether or not schools have a gardening program, a school garden, or a greenhouse students can learn about how plants grow and how to best take care of them. If students become engaged in the material this may even be a sign that the school needs a garden bed for the students to practice growing food!

Gardening Basics

Gardening at school provides students with a more clear understanding of how food is grown. Often school gardens grow simple but healthy vegetables and fruit like carrots, cucumbers, tomatoes, strawberries, squash, and more. Getting their hands in the soil and taking care of the plants throughout the season is a rewarding part of their education. Students can learn about common gardening tools and gardening techniques to give them a proper foundation for how to grow food.

Greenhouses

Students who have the opportunity to have outdoor classrooms can learn about garden designs, greenhouses, and more. Schools that have greenhouses are able to teach students horticulture throughout every season of the year. This sort of hands-on experience for students helps them understand where exactly their food comes from. From the soil to their plate, school gardens provide a unique and valuable learning experience.

Caring for Plants

Alongside encouraging students to get involved in their school fundraising campaign schools can provide basic information for horticulture and general plant care. This would include things like understanding how plants get their nutrients, plant illnesses and root disease, pests, soil quality, watering, photosynthesis, and sun exposure and understanding the signs that plants provide for us to better care for them.

Starting School Garden Program

A school garden program not only provides a unique form of education for many students, but by teaching kids how to grow sustainable food you’re giving them a unique opportunity to provide for themselves outside throughout their lives.  Students can learn many valuable skills through school gardens that can translate into the real world after their time at their schools comes to an end. A simple school garden program needs all of the basics like quality soil, sun exposure, and a water source. School garden beds can be cared for by students as they learn gardening techniques and practical application of their curriculum.

Flower Sale Fundraising

We have found flowers to be an excellent option for school fundraisers, especially when compared to more traditional fundraising products like consumables that don’t feel as unique or special. Because flowers are seasonal we are able to provide a different flower or plant for each season so you’re not left with unenthused customers while you’re raising funds for your school. With flowering being such a versatile gift we find success during many holidays including Easter, Mother’s Day, and more. Because the overhead is lower for flowers, organizers can raise funding for their organization without stressing about large initial investments.

Local Garden & Greenhouse Growers

We offer flowers and plants that have been grown in-house at our very own greenhouse. Every plant JOCO Growers provides is grown by our staff and is grown to help provide funding for schools, garden programs, and other extracurricular programs. JOCO Growers never does any business with big box gardening stores and every plant grown is dedicated to fundraising. We don’t sell plants in any storefronts because we fully believe in our cause. We are fully focused on growing and delivering the highest quality plants to our fundraiser organizers to ensure their customers are thrilled with their purchases. Our locally grown flowers make for an excellent gift as they continue to grow and provide continuous value.

High-Quality Flowers

When selling a product like flowers we understand the importance of providing a high-quality, high-value product. We want to ensure that the organizers who work with us are blown away by the quality of the flowers. We go above and beyond to grow high-quality flowers in rich soil so that when they make it into your customer’s homes the plants are still thriving. With living flowers, it’s crucial to deliver a healthy plant to every customer to avoid mishaps and complaints. Because we grow every single plant in our own greenhouse we can ensure each flower is properly cared for while it grows, and that we aren’t sending out any plant that is not thriving.

Dedicated to Helping Schools

We have extensive experience working with organizers who are looking to provide funding for student programs and have a deep understanding of the process from beginning to end. It is our mission to support schools and help them raise funding for programs that benefit the students. We fully dedicate our grow space to growing flowers for fundraising. We provide a direct customer service experience so anyone helping to organize a fundraiser has the resources they need to succeed.

Learn How JOCO Growers Can Help Your Next Fundraiser

We provide high-quality, healthy plants for many organizations during their fundraising seasons. With our extensive experience in fundraising, we can provide many tips, tricks, and resources to fundraising organizers to help them along the way. We can provide assistance with payment management, marketing materials, help with social media outreach, and more. We have put in the work to streamline our process and create an efficient workflow so parents and teachers aren’t spending valuable time away from the things that are important. By working with JOCO Growers we help organizers of fundraisers get the most out of their experience!