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    Throughout the past 20 years, the National Children & Youth Garden Symposium (NCYGS) has educated thousands of teachers who have, in turn, gone on to educate over a million children: A million children who take this knowledge and apply it to the world around them with curiosity, energy, and genuine appreciation.

    Education

    History

    "I strongly believe that we need to reconnect our children and youth to their green world. As future trustees of our planet, they will only protect what they love, and only love what they know." - Cindy Tyler, Terra Design Studios

    Landscape architects and designers, teachers and staff at botanic gardens around the world consider the "children's garden" as​ one of the strongest trends in gardening. 

    Begun nearly 20 years ago, it continues to generate interest and does not appear to be slowing down.This is attributed to the fact that this inter-generational environment has so many opportunities within its green borders:  helping children develop social skills, enhancing school curricula, bringing families together, and an awareness of the link between nature and our food, clothing and shelter, to name just a few.  Children's gardens replace the free exploration of the natural world that no longer occurs in free exploration of the natural world that no longer occurs in today's era of TV's, video games and concern over safety.

    In 1993 the American Horticultural Society saw a need to reconnect children with nature, so it created the first Children & Youth Garden Symposium that educated and inspired people to look at garden design from a new point of view.  This reconnection was accomplished in landscapes designed specifically for children and the way they play, explore, and interact.  Since that date many thousands of children's gardens have been created all over the world.  AHS is proud to have opened the doors for so many, and the Society continues to embrace all youth garden programming that not only reinforces what has been accomplished so far, but takes children's gardens into the next millennium.


    NCYGS 2013

    ​The 2013 National Children & Youth Garden Symposium is shaping up to be a very exciting event! We have been working closely with our Symposium Host, Denver Botanic Gardens, that is very generously accommodating our group. In addition we have several Symposium Partners - Denver Urban Gardens, The Gardens on Spring Creek (Fort Collins, CO), and Cheyenne Botanic Gardens (Cheyenne, WY) - which you'll have the opportunity to visit and explore their unique take on children's gardening and community building.

    Denver is taking huge steps towards making youth gardening part of everyday life for its residents; holding the symposium here was no accident. You'll experience amazing children's gardens, learn from the expansive knowledge of Denver Botanic Gardens and their impressive 24-acre property, and take a peek at how organizations in Denver are helping local schools support and transform their own students and the local community.