The Montessori Mindset, a podcast by Waterfront Academy
Welcome to The Montessori Mindset, a podcast by Waterfront Academy, where education meets inspiration. Hosted by Melissa Rohan — educator, founder, and Montessori school leader — this show explores the transformative power of Montessori philosophy and child-centered education in today’s world.
Each episode features insightful conversations with educators, child development experts, and visionary school founders who are shaping the future of learning. Together, we dive deep into topics like language acquisition, executive function, faith and character formation, independence, and preparing children for lifelong success.
But this podcast isn’t just theory — it’s practical, too. You’ll also find recordings of parent workshops packed with actionable tips and strategies to help you support your child’s development at home, from nurturing focus and curiosity to creating purposeful environments and fostering bilingual learning.
In This Podcast, You’ll Discover:
- Expert advice on Montessori education, early childhood development, and parenting.
- Inspiring stories from school founders and educators leading innovative programs.
- Step-by-step guidance from real parent workshops to bring Montessori principles into your daily life.
- Honest conversations about challenges, growth, and the joy of raising confident, capable children.
Whether you’re a parent, teacher, homeschooler, or simply passionate about how children learn best, The Montessori Mindset offers wisdom, inspiration, and practical tools to support the journey — from the classroom to the home, and everywhere in between.
The Montessori Mindset, a podcast by Waterfront Academy
Parent Workshop: Growing Together. Gardening with Children in Every Space
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Can you garden with children if you live in an apartment or a small city home?
Absolutely.
In this Montessori parent workshop, we'll explore how gardening can become one of the most meaningful activities you share with your child—whether you have a backyard, a balcony, a windowsill, or just a sunny corner inside your home.
Gardening is about so much more than growing plants. It teaches patience, responsibility, observation, and respect for life. Children experience the wonder of watching a tiny seed transform into something beautiful and useful while developing independence, confidence, and a lifelong connection to nature.
Whether you're growing flowers, herbs, vegetables, or fruit, you'll discover practical ideas that work especially well for urban families and learn how gardening supports every stage of child development through a Montessori lens.
In this workshop, you'll learn:
🌱 Why gardening is one of the most valuable Montessori activities
🌱 How gardening teaches the cycle of life
🌱 The benefits of connecting children with nature in an increasingly digital world
🌱 Simple gardening ideas for apartments, balconies, patios, and small yards
🌱 Age-appropriate gardening activities from preschool through adolescence
🌱 How gardening naturally extends into cooking, flower arranging, science, responsibility, and family traditions
Workshop Chapters
00:00 Introduction
02:15 Why Gardening Matters
07:10 Gardening and Child Development
12:20 Gardening in Small & Urban Spaces
18:30 Montessori Activities by Age
29:45 From Garden to Table
34:00 Flower Arranging & Caring for Beauty
37:00 Simple Ways to Get Started
40:00 Final Thoughts
Resources Mentioned
• Small pots or containers
• Organic potting soil
• Child-sized watering can
• Herbs (basil, parsley, mint)
• Cherry tomatoes
• Strawberries
• Lettuce
• Sunflowers
• Children's garden journal
• Small flower vase and scissors (with adult supervision)
Remember
You don't need a perfect garden.
You simply need one small opportunity for your child to care for something living.
When children water a plant, harvest a tomato, arrange flowers for the dinner table, or taste a strawberry they've grown themselves, they aren't just learning about gardening—they're developing independence, gratitude, patience, and a deeper connection to the natural world.
As Maria Montessori reminded us:
"There must be provision for the child to have contact with nature; to understand and appreciate the order, the harmony and the beauty in nature."
About Melissa Rohan
Melissa Rohan is the Founder and Head of School of Waterfront Academy, a Catholic Montessori school in Washington, DC. She is the author of Nurturing Global Citizens: Implementing Montessori Dual Language Classrooms and presents workshops that help parents and educators create meaningful learning experiences rooted in Montessori philosophy.
Learn more about Waterfront Academy:
https://www.waterfrontacademy.org
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Hello and welcome to today's parent workshop. My name is Melissa Rohan, and I am the founder and head of school here at Waterfront Academy. We're a dual-language English-Spanish Montessori school in the Catholic tradition. And we started back in 2013, if you can believe it. I've been doing this for a while. And I'm excited about today's parent workshop, which is about uh gardening, gardening with your children. Uh called, we're calling this parent workshop Growing Together. I'm really excited about it. This is spring. Today we're at the first week of um April, and um, and I'm already in my head planning all the activities we're gonna do with the students in our garden outside, as well as some of the things that we're gonna do here in the classroom. And I was thinking, wouldn't it be wonderful to do a parent workshop? Because um I know there's a lot of things that we can do at home, whether you're supporting what's going on at the school or you are homeschooling or um or you're a teacher, uh, always good to get some new and fresh ideas. And if you have any, go ahead and like hit me up. Um I I I like learning too. I'm on my own journey here. And uh, anyways, so let's go ahead and get started. Let me share my little presentation here. Here we go. Growing together, gardening with children in every space. So the specifically, I should say that this is a consideration here in Washington, DC. I'm in Washington, DC, as well as any other urban area where uh or city center, you just got a lot of buildings and a lot of people and not a lot of nature. And the Dr. Montessori herself, they uh they were right there in the middle of uh a big city as well. And um, and so she talked about there was not a lot of green space for children, but they were able to make that happen for the children and how important it was. And we're gonna go into that in this um presentation here. But um, but I wanted to in this presentation keep in mind that it is not always easy for uh families if they are living in apartments or in even in these row houses or townhouses or brownstones if you live in it in the northeast. Um so I wanted to give some ideas for families um with limited outdoor space. Okay, so um with that, let's see. Here we go. Um Let me I wonder can I change this layout? Here we go. Let's try this. Yeah. Did it work? Did it change my layout? Okay, so um, so the connection is Dr. Montessori talks a lot about how about gardening and the importance of it. And she talked about a few different aspects of it. So gardening really does align very well with Montessori principles. Through attending the plants, the children engage in purposeful work, which we know is really important in Montessori, um, and builds concentration, that focus, right? So if you think about it, you've got to have a lot of patience when you put that seed in the soil, and then you gotta keep waiting for that seed to sprout and to grow and to blossom. So you're delaying gratification, excuse me. You're getting the child to focus. Um, and then there's just that deep respect of the natural world. You're also learning science. Um and you we can go a little bit for we're gonna go a lot further into this. Um, but one of the big things that we talk about is care of self, care of others, and care of the environment. So this would be a care of the environment or care of the environment activities. And so nurturing living things with intention, surely. Um, real work, that's the other thing. Like having children doing work for purposes of work is kind of frustrating, right? We don't like busy work, children also don't like busy work. But if we were doing work that was meaningful, then all of a sudden there's something to take pride in, and you see the outcome, and you can be proud of that uh when you bring enjoyment to others. And so this is an example of real work. Um, again, as I mentioned before, focus, deep concentration, and it's independence building as well, because like they can do for themselves, and we don't have to do for them, right? So you don't have to go to the grocery store and rely on the grocery store, and then from there, the the truck driver who brought the food to the grocery store, and then from there going backwards, the the farmer who you know planted and nurtured and harvested and packaged all of the goods that was then transported and then put on our shelves, and then we went and bought them. So you're showing that you could do all of that yourself at home, uh, if that was something that you wanted to do, and that is a nice feeling to have that kind of independence. All right. And then in addition to that, you have all of the extensions. So we um Dr. Montessori talks about we um we do here in the school, like you could do fruit. We've got strawberry right now that's growing, and I was talking about it with my sister-in-law. We were laughing about the fruit in the backyard area in the in the garden. Um, and so and how the children were so excited, doesn't matter. Um, so we've got strawberries, so that would be an example of fruit, but we also have a lot, a lot of just uh plants. Um, and then you can also do vegetables and you could do flowers. There's a lot of different kinds of gardens you could do. Um, and I got some examples right here to the side that I'm gonna show you. But if you did grow flowers, the great thing about growing flowers is that the children can go and cut the flowers and then create little um uh vases uh and do some flower arranging. Um if you did fruits and vegetables, then you can eat those things um and you can try different flavors and oh, you know what the children love to do too is they love to smell all the things. So it's very sensorial too. Um we've got some lavender and rosemary out back and they and mint and they love um rubbing those leaves and then smelling them. Um they smell so good. Uh yeah, so there's so they're getting introduced to new smells and flavors and textures that they wouldn't ordinarily want to necessarily adventure into, but since they grew it, well, hey, right? Um and then just being aware of the different seasons. Like I said, we're here in Washington, DC, and this is going to be different than San Diego, um, or uh, or different than Alaska, right? Or Canada. Uh, and so you can kind of feel the seasons and how they change in our community, in our neighborhood, in our area, um and see the cycles with the with the birds, right? That's something that we talk about. We have our birdhouse in the back in the garden. Um, and and so there's in the hummingbirds and the bees. We talk about the bees and the oh, so many things, so many things. It's limitless. Um, and then there's just like family traditions that uh you can create. Um, I know that the children, uh, my children, my personal home children, um, they really enjoy some of the things that we do at home um with the different plants. They like helping me in our front garden. We've got um, let's see, what do we have in the front? We have gardenias, and there's actually a very long tradition in my family with gardenias, and so I when we go and nurture the garden, the gardenias, we harvest the the different flowers, and we bring them in the home. That was something that my grandmother did and my mother did, and and now I'm doing with my children. So, and they're just so fragrant and so beautiful. Another thing that we did in our um front garden at in my home um is we planted bulbs. Um, so that was a lot of fun. And um, and so now every year when the bulbs come up, um, the children get excited about that. And I've got children that are middle school and high school age. Okay, we've been doing this for a while, and and they still get really excited about that. Um, I do too. And um and then in the fall, we pick up all the bulbs and we take care of them over the winter, and then we put them back in. Excuse me, in the late summer, we take out all the bulbs and then we put them back in in the in the in the fall, excuse me. And um, and so we we do have a lot of fun getting our fingernails dirty with that. Um, yeah, so we do a lot of just fun little activities um at home. And so we have those family traditions, and we also have some memories. So during COVID, um, we decided to take all of our groceries and um any of the ends, like the carrot ends, or like that root part of the lettuce or um the the radishes, uh the tops of the radishes, the we just put everything in little um bits of water and wanted to see what was going to um grow some roots, onions. We did onions, uh potatoes, sweet potatoes, avocado, we did the avocado seed. So we do have those memories as well. So there's all kinds of things that you can do, and I'm gonna go over a lot of these different things. I can't believe I'm only on what? Slide three, so exciting. So, getting started. Um, if you have not if gardened before, it is not too challenging. And even if you are not successful, you learn from the failures, right? And that is also a really good lesson. But we want some successes. So, what I would do is I would start with just a plant. Um, oh, I forgot to bring one. Uh, the one I was gonna bring, I didn't bring up here. Um, I had gone to many years ago um over to Trader Joe's, and they have those little pots of plants, right? And um, and I had bought one for my um adolescent class. And um, and then at the end of that year, after taking care of that plant, it had grown quite a bit, actually. And so we were able to um you know trim it a bit and then take the trimmings and put them in water and watch those roots grow. And then we um planted those roots, and then they took those home for the summer. So it was kind of interesting for them, and that is something that you can do, just one plant, right? So we did a whole year just working off of this one Trader Joe's plant, five bucks maybe, and it was uh a whole year of lessons. Um and and you can do that, and you can take care of it together, everyone has a a responsibility for this plant. Um, and then and and making notes of what happens, like different lighting and etc. So again, a lot of this is based on how old your children are and the amount of um experience you have, but that is, I think, a very great way to get started. Oh boy, how did we get here? Let's go back. Um let's see, one three. Oh, we missed so many things. Okay, so the cycle of life, um, which is some like I I kind of talked about, you know, in gardening, we start with our seeds and then we can watch how it all and each plant is somewhat different, right? To a degree. And um, whether it's a flowering seed or if it's a fruit or a vegetable, uh, or flowering plant, excuse me, or fruit or vegetable, or what have you. Um, and so they have different, slightly different life cycles, not not too different, but you know, you can, and the children can draw it out and they create can have their own journal in there. Um what's also really great about this, if this is something that's going on in your house and you want to break the habit of using screens, this would be a great way to do it. And the funny thing is, um you can see nature in itself is attractive and offers a rich field for observation and discovery. It's not too hard to get the children to go out and play in the garden um and play, you know, and work with the materials and work with the um different plants and um and things. And so I think that is an extremely um interesting um way to get them off the screens. Um if that is an issue you have in your home. Uh let's see, so that now, when it comes to being in a big city, like I've mentioned before, you're gonna have to get a little creative, right? So um you can and you can buy these kits, right? There are these kits that exist that are great. Um, and I've done that before. Um, also, it's like almost nothing. I think it's like 99 cents per little seed packet. Go get the seeds. I did this with the with my adolescents um a few years ago. Um, so what we did was we had created our own greenhouse and we started from seeds. And um, and so that that was a great, great activity. And what we used because we didn't in that particular um adolescent classroom, we were like an interior room. We had no lights whatsoever, no windows. Lights, yes, windows, no, we didn't, we had no sunlight in that room. And so what we did was we brought one of those um indoor growing lights in there, and it was fantastic. So if you have um, if you don't have great sunlight, not a big deal. And I gotta say this, because this is important. The growing light that I had back then was a monster of like it took a lot of real estate in that classroom. It was a huge, um, and it was very bulky, and it like didn't, it wasn't great. Um, it was clearly meant to be affixed to a ceiling or something like that, and then shown on, you know, and then it would, you know, give off light to the plants underneath it. And now what I've seen are these cute little desk lamps that like have little goosenecks to them, and you can pop them right over the plant. I mean, wow, so convenient and perfect for these, you know, homes, homes that don't necessarily have the best uh light coming in, or rooms that don't have the best sunlight coming in, not great windows. So I let me just say that's a great idea. Also, um, one year we did one of these um hydroponic kits. Again, back to the kits, they're great, and um, and that's great for year-round because like in the winter, it can be kind of tough to get the the light you need for these plants. Um and they're and they're very convenient, they're not quite as expensive as they used to be. Um in fact, I've seen them at uh the thrift store. So if you wanted to buy it secondhand, I'm sure, like on Facebook Marketplace or whatever, I'm sure that would be completely wonderful. Um, and so you could do that. Um also I have seen now, I've not done this personally, but I have seen people on their balconies do like these vertical planters. I've actually been wanting to do that in our garden here. So it's like a project, maybe not this year, but for next year possibly, where is to do one of those vertical planters or rail boxes. We've got rail boxes on um our front stoop. So those are great too. Um, so I've done a lot of these things myself. I haven't done um the vertical planters yet. Very excited to do that. Um, but I have done a lot of these other things and they're wonderful. And as I mentioned previously, you can it you don't have to do all that much. You could just use your like the the throwaway ends of your uh of your groceries while you're making, and you cut off and you lob off that top, you can use the top of the carrot or the potato, or like I said, the pit of the the seed of the avocado. I mean, so many, so many things. So exciting. Okay, so just some ideas. So as I was saying, start small, one plant, one pot, one routine, and then you can you know trim it and propagate. It's wonderful. Um, so for let me go through now, we're gonna go through like the different ages and like different things for different ages, right? So two to six, two and a half to six, three to six, uh watering plants. That is wonderful. And it's you know, it what's so funny about watering plants is that the first time out, the kids are so excited, the children are so excited, they just dump, I mean, like dump so much water, the plants just floating. So, you know, um get good good drainage, pro tip there. Um, and they love wiping the leaves. So, like, oh, we have a Monstera, and the children love, oh, and um, so Monstera, here is um an orchid that um that they can wipe the leaves of. This was a funny situation because this was a a dying orchid, and um somebody brought it to me and said, Do you think you can help fix my the dying orchid? And so what's interesting is that like you know, if you repot this and you put it in normal soil, it kind of suffocates these. You can kind of see it on here where it kind of ruined the roots. You see it right there, and um they kind of suffocate. But you know, these these these were kind of on trees, you know, and so these roots would kind of get them anchored onto the trees, and they're not really supposed to be in soil. Um, and so we took our orchid out, and um and so what we do now, because I think it's interesting the children find it interesting, and I find it uh their interest interesting, is um We just we have not we have not potted it and and yet we've been able to to obviously um bring it back to life and um and what we do is we just put it in water for a day and then we take it out, let it dry, and then we put it in water for a day and then take it out for drying. Um we go back and forth on that. So this is our orchid, isn't that nice? Um and um and so they can wipe the leaves. Planting seeds, also wonderful idea. Um, so there's a lot of different ways that you can do this so that they can see the cycle of life, right? So you and I'm sure some of this is stuff that you did at um at home or when you were a child, you can take like a lima bean, right? And you can dampen it and put it in water, and then like put it in like a like a paper towel. I've got one here, right? Um, and then you could, if you wanted, take that lima bean that you put in here and then put it into like a little uh bag that closes as such, and then right, and then you can just take this to the window. We had a lot of fun with that. Um if you didn't, if you wanted it to another, I actually like the second idea better, is you can fill it to here with soil, plant the bean in there, and then you get to kind of see the roots and I again uh different ideas uh to be creative with. Um we've also you know you know those clear egg uh containers, you know? We've done that um because it makes a natural greenhouse in it and um and so you don't have to water it quite as often, um, and they poke through, or the natural one where you can just cut them and just put the whole egg you know cavity into the soil after it starts going. So lots of different ideas there. Um and uh, you know, just to play around with, try different things. Um each each each spring, you know, different try try a new way. Um and then flower arranging. Go out into the garden, cut, you know, a bunch of the flowers, arrange them into I we have um a ton of those little um uh different sizes, different widths, um vases. So here would be an example. I've got one here. There we go. There we are. It's gonna be a nice little vase. I'm gonna put that guy back in there. Um we have so many of them everywhere. Um, so the children get to pick the vase that they want, and then they get to put water in there and then put the plant in, and et cetera, or the flowers, excuse me. So lots of different ideas, perfect for this age. Um and we have a little, you know, watering can similar to that. We've got several of them around, and um so when they think of it, they just go and water the plants. And and young children, old children, they love doing it. Um, it doesn't matter. All right, there we are with some flower arranging. Um that's a cute little um vase there. Uh again, perfect for for this kind of activity for this age group. Um so yeah, the cutting, placing of the stems, um, brain motor skills, just concentration, lots of wonderful things happening while they're doing this. The 6 to 12 at elementary age, now we want them to have a little bit of responsibility. We want them to look at the bigger picture and the smaller picture, like they want they're interested in like the smallest thing and they're interested in the biggest thing. And so we kind of try and meet them where they are. Um, and so this would be a great time. And let me show you, bring the space back. So this would be perfect. This is our bamboo. I got it at IKEA, right? And then we took the little um plastic uh root container off of it, and so they're very interested in looking at that at the roots, and so we might put some of the roots under the microscope so they could take a look at that. Um very interesting. Um and we, you know, they they're very that's very interesting. And this when I when we got this, it was just like a teeny bit, and you can see how much bigger it's grown. They think that's interesting as well. Um they're really excited about that. Um, so yeah, so we've got the roots going on there. Um the other thing that's kind of interesting is getting unusual plants. So um here I have because they're interested in the smallest thing, like I said, the biggest thing. And they're also interested in like the unusual thing. I have a um a set um that I have for the elementary, and we go over um some of the most unusual plants, and they just think it is it. I mean, it's just pure learning, and it's fun, and it's just amazing. So, but right here, as you can see, you've got the string of pearls um plant, and they think that's really funny, you know, and they do a really good job of keeping these plants. So you can see down here, this plant was I just purchased this plant this fall, and um and so when I purchased it, actually the lady that I bought it from was like, I cannot keep these things alive. I am just giving you this plant, and I felt bad that she gave me the plant for free that I went and bought another plant. Um, but the children did such a great job with this plant. You can see at the top here how it's just producing so many more pearls um at the top than it did here at the bottom. Um, so it's exciting. This is, you know, one winter's worth of growth. So, oh, I wonder how this summer's gonna go. Very exciting. Um, so there they'll see how that grows. Um and the remember, I told you with the um with the older children in the adolescent classroom, I had created a um, well, they did, um a whole greenhouse, right? Um so what we did in the elementary classroom one year is so this plant here is really wonderful. Um it starts with a T. Anyways, um, but it just grows so well. So what we had done was we had um mason jars, filled it in with like um some soil, moistened the soil, added some of the of this, some clippings of this into there, and then sealed it, and then they got to watch it just flourish in these little mini uh terrariums, and um, and they just it was such a great project for them. They could see how it would grow, and then they got to take them home. It was wonderful. So we did uh we've done that before, and you know, so so many ideas, anyways. And so in the elementary, we want them to also, in addition to like looking at the smallest thing, looking at the biggest thing, we want them to, like I said, with the small little terrarium, we want them to measure and uh track the progress. We do little garden journals. Um, and remember, I talked about the compost kitchen scraps, that's the next one here. That was so much fun. Um, when we did the garden, but you can also do the composting. And um in one of our gardens, we had like a little um compost right into the garden. So it was like a little pit. Um, and when we created the garden, we had created this pit, and um, and so the children, they oh my gosh, they really enjoyed being in charge of compost, you know, they had all their duties, and one of them was in charge of compost, one was in charge of watering, one was in charge of harvesting, one was in charge of pruning, one of them was in charge of propagating and seed collection. I mean, it was they all had their different uh tasks, and they would share those tasks. So sometimes somebody had it, and sometimes other people had it, but the composting, it was really fun. We had these little charts up and what was green compost versus brown compost, and like how much of each they need to do and the layers of it, like a lasagna. Ah, so much fun, anyways. So we talk about that. Um they would bring in compost from home. I remember that memories they just flood into me, and I just get so much joy. We had students, not one, multiple students, who would take the compost from home, put it in a in a bag as such, put it in their lunch, bring it to school, and then during lunchtime they would add their home compost to the slow compost. It was such so much fun, anyways. So um, and then they like cooking. Cooking is great, and you can use all the stuff that you make in the backyard um in your home cooking. Now, uh, pro tip here on this one is that you want to make sure that what just be careful of any kinds of fertilizer or any kind of pest treatment that you might be using in your garden if you're doing this outside, because if you're gonna eat it, you don't want that stuff necessarily. Um, so just keep that in mind. Um, so if you are planning on eating, plan for that accordingly. All right. So, gardening journals, we had talked about um now 12 to 14. You know what? Actually, going back to the gardening journals, I bet you I have the document around here pretty pretty accessibly. Let me I'm gonna see if I can find that and we can attach it. Um, because I think that would be a great idea. Um make it easy for you guys. Just download it and you can use you make a bunch of copies of it and uh or or however, whatever, whatever. Um, so the adolescents, we do 12 through 14 in our school. Um, again, cooking is wonderful. I like so they're very entrepreneurial at this age, and I like kind of leaning into that. So we do talk about like what it would be to have a farm stand, and um, we talk about our um um the budget and we look at the costs and the perspective possible revenues um and uh and things like that. We also talk about like like I said, we had at one time we had a uh an indoor greenhouse, and um, and so they kind of laid all that out before beforehand. And so I like them planning, I like them thinking ahead, I like them hitting against like natural constraints that just that's life, and so that they can problem solve and figure out other solutions to meet their objectives, right? So that is part of that. Um, cooking again, cooking meals, like I said, and then sell produce at markets or to neighbors again. Um, and you can do that at home as well. Um, we in my neighborhood here we have a family that sells honey because they've got a bee, an urban bee. Um, and so they do sell honey. Um so that, and I know of another Montessori school now, they're out in Virginia, but they sell their eggs from their chickens that they have. They get to have chickens. We don't. Um, but if you if that was something that you had, you could do that. Um and and so uh just some thoughts there. We did um one year with the rosemary make rosemary salt, and uh, and that was fun. Um, so when you have you, you know, rosemary, some of these herbs, you can do um packets of dried dill, packets of dried lavender, packets of you know, that they can use that people can buy to use in their cooking or in their home, I don't know. Um etc. So just just some ideas there. Uh from garden to table. So children, they eat what they grow. It is they will, I mean, I have had so many parents say this to me over the years. They're like, how do you get my children to eat carrots? Well, if they're making the carrots, if they're growing, not making, they're growing the carrots, then they harvest the carrots, then they clean and chop the carrots, they're gonna eat the carrots, right? So if they're part of the the farm to table um progression, then they're very interested in uh reaping the rewards of the effort, right? And so just if while you're planning on this, just keep that in mind that um they're very excited. So I remember, for example, in our home, which was at during COVID, was we had it, we lived in a different home, and it was very tiny. Um, we had three children that were running around. Um, and so we had taken our onions and put them in water, and then they the roots started growing, and then like they started sprouting out, and so we would cut the tops of the and we would add that to our umiles. They like the little greens on top, and they just thought that was the greatest thing. See, you can do the same thing with the um the tops of the carrots, the green part. You can make a really great pesto with that. Um and and the children think that's like the best thing in the world, so they'll they'll try it. They don't like pesto, but they like the pesto that they made. Just keep that in mind. Um so, and this is I think true of all humans, not just children. We need to be in warm sunlight, we need to have fresh air, we need to have soil and leaves and all sticks, all of those things. We need that, we need to be connected with those things. Rainwater, for example, being standing in the rain. We need that, and um it's it's just so fundamental to our health. We are humans meant to be in nature, and um, and so the more that you can make that connection happy happen, the healthier your family and your children will be. I mean, there are some really great studies out there on sunlight, there's great studies out there on fresh air. So I it just um there's some interesting things that I have seen on like soil. Um I you know, that one I don't know as much, but um, but it's there, so I believe that there must be something to it. Um, so I just I wanted to put that out there is that like the more connections you can make between human and nature, the better our health is. We are meant to be in nature, we're not meant to be in concrete. Um, let's see. Um, oh, and I already covered this, the connection between all of this gardening and um and and uh in Montessori. She talks an awful lot about it and how important it was in her research with the children in their development. Um and so we talked about this. The boy, I I uh I really skipped a lot of the meat. Huh. Okay, getting started. We talked about that. All right, and there we are. There must be uh provision for the child to have contact with nature to understand and appreciate the order, the harmony, and the beauty in nature. So true. Thank you, Dr. Manessori. And I hope this is helpful for you. All right, and with that, have a wonderful time outdoors, and until next time.