There a good chance that your kids have jabbed a utensil into a pumpkin at home or at school this month. But aside from creative carving they may not know that a pumpkin has many other uses, ones that are much more sustainable than spending a couple of weeks decorating your front porch. In fact, pumpkins can teach your children about a lot – including food security!
Pumpkins serve as en excellent teaching tool about health, nutrition, and sustainable living. Fill your kids in accordingly and they’ll never look at this winter squash the same ever again.
3 Other Things Your Children Can Use a Pumpkin for Today That Will Teach Them About Healthy and Sustainable Living
1. A Healthy Snack to Fuel Their Day
In our article about what to do with used pumpkins we discussed how seed removal, cleaning, drying, and containerization can teach them all about seed preservation. That’s absolutely true! However, set some aside so that they can have a healthy snack to fuel their day at school. Pumpkin seeds are loaded with nutrients, delivering protein, healthy fats (omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids) along with iron, calcium, B2, folate and beta-carotene.
2. Baking and Cooking
Baking and cooking TV shows where kids are the participants are all the rage right now. Young teens are glued to the Food Network’s “Kids Baking Championship” and “Chopped Junior” along with Disney’s “Be Our Chef”. Now is a great time to foster this budding interest through the magic of the pumpkin patch!
Like with seeds, the fleshy insides of a pumpkin are also jam-packed with nutrients, but who wants to eat them like that? Instead, your kids can start with an easy recipe that delivers a delicious and nutritious result – pumpkin purée. Once they have the purée, a baker’s dozen of other recipes await. The purée can be used to make pumpkin pies, pancakes, soups, pasta sauces, and so much more.
Have your children perform an online search for pumpkin recipes and let them determine what they want to make. Can’t decide what to do with it all? Fret not, because extra purée can be stored in your freezer for several months, providing an easily accessible ingredient for a number of baked goods and dishes that your kids have not yet realized.
3. A Pumpkin Planter
Your children are already accustomed to getting their hands delightfully gooey to hollow out pumpkins. But we have a far better decorative (and functional) undertaking for them – create a pumpkin planter!
You’ll need to start with a small plant that has already begun to spout from its nursery container. From there, fill about one-third of the hollowed pumpkin with lightweight potting soil. Transplant the plant from the nursing container and set its roots on top of the soil within the pumpkin so that the spouting plant sticks out of the top. Add more potting soil around the plant to provide it with the foundation it needs to grow, and voilà – you have a seasonal planter that will look amazing on your porch, window sill, or along the path of your yard.
Of course, this natural planter won’t last the season, but that’s where another teaching opportunity comes along! Pumpkin “waste” makes for an excellent garden compost. But don’t worry, you don’t have to transplant the young plant again so that it can continue to thrive as you smash the pumpkin into mulch. We have a far easier and enriching alternative. Once the pumpkin begins to rot and lose its aesthetic, simply dig the entire pumpkin planter into the soil (with the plant still in it) of your yard or community garden and let nature take its course. As the rest of the pumpkin rots a natural fertilizer for the young plant and neighboring vegetation is created.
Stay tuned for other fun and educational ideas from the Plant a Seed & See What Grows Foundation, and learn more about how you can get involved in our funded programs that benefit kids across Canada.
