Junior World Childcare

Froggy's Garden

In the year of the stories 2022 the children’s garden tells the story about Froggy.

Froggy is a toy that was found in the playing field. Several children worked together to turn an old fruit box into a home for Froggy.

We chose this story after consulting with the children, they wanted to make Froggy a garden because his fruit box was becoming overcrowded, and he needed a wee pond.

Froggy in his new home

Friends for Froggy

Flowers enjoying the sun

Froggy’s garden is wildlife friendly due to using recycled and natural materials: logs, leaves and cones. This will provide a hiding place for worms, insects and arachnids. We reused an old pallet, fencing, recycled ice cream tubs for seedlings and broken terracotta pot (shaded area for Froggy).

The garden will attract pollinators due to sowing early flowering plants such as forget me not. The wildflowers will soon be in bloom, ensuring a steady flow of pollen for the coming months. Water mint has also been sown, attracting pollinators in mid to late summer. Water mint prefers damp conditions, so the children have been watering every day. There have been no pesticides used in the garden. The edible plants growing are strawberry, runner bean, tomato, pepper and water mint.

The children have enjoyed learning all about the life cycle of frogs. First, they researched how to create a habitat that would attract frogs. Tadpoles have been in for a visit twice, giving the children the opportunity to observe stages of development. The children have learnt how to sow, grow and care for plants.

Through gardening the children have been encouraged to eat healthily, learned new skills, taken on responsibility, co-operated with each other and taken part in physical activity. Gardening has nurtured a love of nature in our children.

We have worked with our local community to create Froggy’s garden. We have engaged with a local charity Green Hive, using leaves that the children collected from the community leaf bays. We received donations of a wooden pallet, old fencing, plants, seeds, compost (peat free), scrapbook, garden ornaments: Gnome (Bob with solar lights attracting pollinators), fairy garden ornaments and pots.

The garden will remain in place as it provides a space for nature.

For several weeks the children have been designing a book all about Froggy’s journey, it is full of photos, pictures and the story of his journey. You can see some of the pages below.

The Legend of Froggy

Garden Design

Creating the garden - from design to reality