A book extract from Garden Crafts for Children including planting a sunflower alley and constructing a multi-storey insect hotel.

“Children and gardening seem an obvious combination. A chance to play with water and get filthy without pesky grown-ups becoming annoyed – what’s not to love? But despite a massive rise in school gardening over the past decade, this doesn’t always translate to youngsters at home.

“So how do you encourage children to pick up a rake rather than a remote? This is something I’ve tried to tackle in Garden Crafts for Children. Rather than talking in depth about horticultural subjects such as germination or soil preparation, which may put off children and less-confident parents, the book tries to inspire them with projects to create themselves, with a little supervision.

“The fact that they learn gardening skills along the way is the happy side effect. It’s like hiding the cauliflower of horticulture beneath the cheese sauce of crafts.”

Read the whole article here.