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Themes
Gardens and plants

A garden is a planned space, usually outdoors, set aside for the display, cultivation, and enjoyment of plants and other forms of nature.

Plants are a major group of living things including familiar organisms such as trees, flowers, herbs, ferns, and mosses. About 350,000 species of plants, defined as seed plants, bryophytes, ferns and fern allies, have been estimated to exist. As of 2004, some 287,655 species had been identified.

Double-click on any word to see its definition from Cambridge Dictionaries Online

magazine article: Gardening - The Beginnings "Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made, By singing: -"Oh, how beautiful!" and sitting in the shade. Rudyard Kipling, 'The Glory of the Garden'" Read article

magazine article: The Life of Trees. "When I was a child I read a science fiction story that made me think about trees in a new way. In the story, visitors from an advanced civilisation come to our planet and their spaceship lands in the middle of a forest. The aliens have a long conversation with the trees of the forest, and then leave again, happy to think that the inhabitants of earth are noble, intelligent and peaceful." Read article

word game: Gardens. Match the names of things used in the garden and activities related to gardens to pictures of them. Play game (1) and game (2).

word game: Plants. Match the names and pictures of different types of plants and parts of plants to descriptions of these. Play game (1) and game (2).

word game: Vegetables. Match the names of different types of vegetables to pictures of them. Play game (1) and game (2)

story: Look what the cats dug up!. An old woman lives with her many cats in a lovely little garden full of orange trees. They the developers come along, planning to build a new road. All of the neighbours are worried, but the cats have other ideas ... Read story

story: The Lorax. This children's story by Dr. Seuss chronicles the plight of the environment and the Lorax (a "mossy, bossy" man-like creature), who speaks for the trees against the greedy Once-ler.Read story

story: The Three Tree Thieves. Terry had a problem. There was a big tree blocking his view. So he got two friends to help him get rid of it. Would they manage to do that and get away with it? Read story

poem: Banyan Tree. This poem is by Nobel Prize for Literature winner Rabindranath Tagore, from India. Tagore once said ‘To study a banyan tree, you not only must know its main stem in its own soil, but also must trace the growth of its greatness in the further soil, for then you can know the true nature of its vitality’. Read poem

poem: I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud. This famous poem by William Wordsworth (1770-1850) was inspired by the Spring flower, the yellow, or golden daffodil. Read poem

poems: Spring. Two seasonal poems from Hiroko Okawa of Japan - a poem dedicated to the cherry blossoms and another poem called Jade. Read poems

cartoon: "Hello, Honey" See cartoon
"Annie, what do you call the 'skin' of a tree?""I don't know." "Bark, girl, bark!" See cartoon
"Santa! Why are you out here in the garden?" "Because I love to ..." See cartoon

trivia: Quote: "A prudent man does not make the goat his gardener. (Hungarian) "See more gardens and plants trivia

links: Gardens. Wikipedia: garden See more links

links: Trees. Wikipedia: tree See more links

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