UT Gardens: Grands & Me (ages 4-12 with a grandparent) Camps

Make memories while gardening with your grandchild. These camps give grandparents a chance to be a kid again and experience the UT Gardens with their grandchildren.

May 29, 9:30 AM – 2:00 PM: The Garden as a Botany Lab
In this day camp we will explore the garden as a living botanical laboratory. We’ll observe unique plants, learning how they reproduce, survive, and contribute to the ecological food web. Participants will observe, plants, fungi, seeds, leaves, flowers, fruits, and fruit in the garden. We’ll explore how plants function as miniature factory producing food and clean air. We’ll even learn how to reproduce and clone plants!

July 6, 9:30 AM – 2:00 PM: Sustainable Nature Art
This camp will explore the concept of Nature Art. We will view examples of art around UT Gardens, learn what it meant to make nature art, and how to make sustainable art. We will compare examples of traditional art and nature art, explore simple design principles. Then we will learn to make some of our own art supplies from materials around the garden, use them to sketch and plan a sculpture, and then each grandparent and grandchild will create their own temporary nature art sculpture installation!

July 27, 9:30 AM – 2:00 PM: ​​Botanical Garden Buffet
This day camp will be all about eating in the outdoors! We’ll explore the gardens learning how gardens fit into the food web, different ways to grow food, harvest it, and how to forage for food as well! We’ll learn to plant, collect, clean, and a prepare snacks and recipes from the garden. Participants will transplant veggie seedlings to take home to grow!

Cost: $25/members; $30/nonmembers. All programs require preregistration. Contact Derrick Stowell, Director of Education, at dstowell@utk.edu, (865) 974-7151, or click on the links below to register. To register for camps visit https://ag.tennessee.edu/utg/Pages/camps.aspx.