A recent study by the Royal Horticultural Society says that gardening can make a child feel happy and boost their development, H&C has learned. The study by RHS Gardening in Schools found that children in schools that encouraged gardening became more resilient, confident and lived healthier lives.

Dr Simon Thornton Wood, Director of Science and Learning, RHS, said: “As the new coalition government considers a new approach to the primary curriculum, we hope they acknowledge the striking conclusions of our research and that gardens enable a creative, flexible approach to teaching that has significant benefits.

“Schools which integrate gardens into the curriculum are developing children who are much more responsive to the challenges of adult life.”

Commissioned by the RHS from independent researchers the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER), the report highlights how schools which actively use a garden, develop ‘resilient,’ ‘ready to learn’ and ‘responsible’ children – 3R attributes that make up well-balanced, happier, healthy, rounded individuals. The RHS believes these three Rs can be learnt when gardening is used as a teaching tool, not just an extra-curricular activity.

The NFER surveyed a selection of 1,300 school teachers and studied in-depth 10 schools belonging to the RHS Campaign for School Gardening, from a large urban London primary to small village school in Yorkshire, to discover that gardening in schools encourages children to:

Gillian Pugh, Chair of the National Children’s Bureau and The Cambridge Primary Review, says: “Not only does gardening provide opportunities for increasing scientific knowledge and understanding, and improving literacy, numeracy and oracy, but this report shows that it also improves pupils’ confidence, resilience and self-esteem.”

In 2007, the RHS Campaign for School Gardening was launched to encourage schools to create gardens. There are currently 12,000 schools signed up to the Campaign, benefiting over 2.5million pupils.