I did this with all my art classes (prep – 6) in the first week of school. We planted the mushrooms in the front school garden. It was so great to see students so proud of their art, showing each other, desperate to show their parents after school and watching families walking in and around the mushrooms together.

::: Heather we had the same response from our kinder children. We then visited a local primary school – Croydon West Primary school, and planted mushrooms in their sensory garden which encouraged the students there to get on board the project too!

[...] with it too!  (Check out Teacher Tom’s mushrooms here, and more gorgeous creations over at Irresistible Ideas for Play Based Learning.  Can’t wait to see who else plays along.)  Using humble brown paper bags, even young kids [...]

What a great project to be part of and the mushrooms look great! Thanks for sharing the links.

lisa

Love it, luv it, LURVE IT !!!!!!!!!!

Thanks Tom …. and yes I have sent him a link!

Yay! Doug is going to be so happy. Have you sent him a link? If you haven’t, I will.

You’re right Jenny the kids were crazy for this idea It was just one of those things that simply took off! Before we started planning the garden we took lots of photos of the space from every imaginable angle. That way when ever we got a brilliant ‘thought’ which was usually away from kinder, one quick look at the pictures and you could pretty well tell if the idea would work. I (Donna) even took to drawing my ideas straight onto the photo … I’m a very visual person. Good luck with it Jenny and keep us posted !

Oh wow, they look fantastic. I love the picture of the view from the gate into the garden with a vista of musrooms. Your kids must have been really into it to produce so many. I only had a handful of kids interested on the day we did our mushrooms, so my visions of a mushroom invasion like yours swiftly disappeared!

Your garden is looking just beautiful. Every time I look at a new photo I see something new I love, or another idea I store away. Starting Monday my director has set aside 1/2 hour for us to start planning our outdoors in earnest (doesn’t sound like much time, but you know how hard it is to get away). I’m so excited that stuff might actually get done instead of living vicariously through you guys and teacher tom!

Hi Tammy! Certainly the decorating aspect of this project would be heaps of fun for a two year old! If you mean might a two year old be able to follow Doug’s instructions to make the mushroom … well heck it is art isn’t it … and art is creative … so we say provide all two year olds with paper bags and let them make their own unique mushroom shape … So I guess the answer is YES we reckon a two year old might just love this project!

That looks fantastic! Your garden really does look magical. Do you think a 2 year old might be able to handle a project like this?