This winter secondary schools in Yorkshire and the Humber area are considering integrating gardening into their curriculums under the STEM initiative. (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths).They are considering projects which will link these subjects together and gardening is an ideal medium to do this.

An example of this would be a small biomass, initiative in which children will grow willow from hardwood cuttings, they will then 'harvest' a sample, work out the calorific value and then build structures and art work with the excess willow. Another possible initiative linked to this is to make charcoal pencils from the willow.

Several schools are also interested in growing sunflowers, extracting the oil with a home made press and then running a table top steam engine with a generator to produce electricity.

 If any schools in the area have additional ideas or would like to find out more please contact me at schoolgardeningyork@rhs.org.uk or respond to this blog.

Please keep you eyes peeled early next term in the 'news' area of '  for details of free 'twilight' training in the region on our website .