Gardening & Literacy

Funds from The New York Newspapers Foundation will enable the Learning Place to establish a new program designed to help women become more self-sufficient.

We will create an atmosphere within our center to enrich their learning experience with technology, and books. The program will also teach them practical business skills, and how to design their own “garden,” and to implement ideas by producing a product to sell.

TLP students will correspond with Operation Upgrade, a South African project that reaches impoverished people with the gift of literacy. Operation Upgrade constructs greenhouses called “tunnels” and gives women the opportunity to grow and sell their own produce to help support and sustain their families and villages.

I'm interested in hearing about other literacy organizations that might be using the gardening experience in their tutoring programs. How has it encouraged YOUR students?