Raising plants indoors is a great way to anticipate what nature will be doing outdoors, as Kathy Swinburne at Busy Bears Children's Day Nursery, Co Durham, discovers.

One day a child asked me, 'Why are there no flowers on the trees?' The question prompted me to look into ways of showing the children how to grow flowers indoors during the gloomy winter months so that they could discover the answer to this question for themselves.

I thought about how gardening could offer a range of learning opportunities by promoting a child's curiosity and developing their observational skills while they were having fun during hands-on indoor activities with natural materials.

As a whole group we talked about our own gardens and discovered that some children are involved in the upkeep of an allotment at home. This led to the suggestion of growing our own vegetables. We talked about which vegetables were our favourites, and I purchased the appropriate seeds.

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