Success Story4-H Windowsill Garden Project



4-H Windowsill Garden Project

Author: Raymond Cox

Planning Unit: Harlan County CES

Major Program: Agriculture

Plan of Work: Improve and sustain agriculture production

Outcome: Long-Term Outcome


The 4-H Windowsill Garden Project is designed around the five steps in gardening, with a focus on careers and providing food for the family.  The five steps are:  planting, growing, caring, harvesting and consuming.  All students in every elementary school in Harlan County participate in this project, reaching approximately 3,500 students this spring alone. This project also promotes project entries of vegetables in the Harlan County Fair. One student did a 4-H Demonstration on Windowsill Garden and Grow Your Own Tomatoes during the County 4-H Communications Day. During the month of April as we take ribbons into the school as the reward of growing their tomatoes we also give them a lesson and a flyer called “Grow Your Own Tomatoes.”  The handout tells the students and parents how to take care and grow their tomatoes during the summer. In Windowsill Garden Project, students plant tomato seeds in a peat pellet cup and care for the seedlings for five weeks.  During this time, students keep growth charts and record procedures for watering, and (if used) fertilizing.  At the end of the five week period, students take their seedlings home, transplant them into gardens, buckets, flower pots or flower beds.  In addition to schools' project, Windowsill Gardens are given out on Earth Day at Wal-Mart, reaching over 300 families. Evaluation experiences provide students feedback on this project.   All students will be awarded 4-H Project Ribbons for their efforts.  Blue, red, and white award ribbons will be given to the students to take home with their projects.  Many students expressed that their tomatoes did very well last year and that they helped provide vegetables for the summer for their families.  Students have been excited to participate this year in the annual project.  Some students have grown tomatoes beginning in K-4, and were eager to let us know all the years they had been growing tomatoes








Stories by Raymond Cox


Chicken Incubation

about 5 years ago by Raymond Cox

This spring, over six hundred Cloverbud, School Enrichment, Special Interest and 4-H Club members fr... Read More


4-H Safety Day

about 5 years ago by Raymond Cox

Oer 400 students attended the 17th Annual 4-H Safety Day held April 12 at National Guard Armory. All... Read More


Stories by Harlan County CES


Appalachian Challenge Academy

about 5 years ago by Lora Davidson

In the state of Kentucky 774 children have lived in juvenile correction facilities in 2013. Accordin... Read More


Agriculture Sustainability

about 5 years ago by Jeremy Williams

Harlan County has a long history that involves home horticulture and small farming operations. With... Read More