general guiding in the course of which pupils learn about the Botanical Garden and its activities
	a number of thematic lessons
	natural history days
	guided excursions to the environs of Ljubljana to visit particularly interesting examples of the world of plants
	drafting of a research or a seminar work supervised by one of our mentors
	all of the programs are provided also as additional expert training for teachers
	dealing with optional school topics.

The topics relate to the curricula of all grades and can be applied to broaden, illustrate and build up the regular pedagogical process. Lectures can always be adapted to the level of the previous knowledge and to any special wish such as you may express.

People generally know less and less about the fascinating world of plants. Our expertly trained collaborators will make pupils aware of the nature where we live but to which we pay hardly any attention at all. Look at the detailed thematic program , schedule of charges and mode of registering for a guided tour, and come to see us as soon as you can make it.

Thematic Tours    

	General Tour of the Botanical Garden
	Importance of the Botanical Garden
	Seasons in the Botanical Garden
	From the Life of Plants
	Habitats and Geographic Distribution of Plants
	Trees and Shurbs
	Plant System
	Excursions into the Environs of Ljubljana

A detailed Program of Guided Thematic Tours through the Botanical Garden:

1. General Tour of the Botanical Garden    

We take a walk though all parts of the Botanical Garden: arboretum, rockgarden, tropical greenhouse, marshland, plant system ... and learn about typical plants, their characteristics, habitats ...

2. Imporatnce of the Botanical Garden  

The Botanical Garden is much more than an interesting park. You can view, virtually in the very center of Ljubljana, endangered, rare or almost entirely extinct species, and have an inkling of the great biodiversity of Slovenia, seeing also animals that have found refuge in conditions closely imitating those in nature. You will be shown how rare species are grown in culture and enabled to survive. We shall demonstrate some of our experiments on plants and assist you at planning and carrying out your own.

• Botanical Garden and its importance

• Botanical Grden as a habitat

• Botanical Garden: display window opening onto the biodiversity of the world of plants

• Botanical Garden and nature conservation (endemic species, endangered and extinct plants, genetic bank)

• Botanical Garden as a live bank and as a seed genetic bank

• Cultivation of endangered and endemic species in garden cultures

• Experiments on plants, planning of a research task

• Our plants and their use in horticulture

• Work in the garden, tools and professions

• Soil and plants: formation and properties of soil types, composting, maintenance of fertility

3. Seasons in the Botanical Garden    

Each season reveals its own picture of the world of plants. Early spring is heralded by the widely known spring plants - snowdrops, crocuses, hellebores, primroses. Summer spreads its bloom over the lawns, shrubs, rockgarden and flower beds. Autum is the time of maturing fruits and crops, of coloured falling leaves. The Botanical Garden is interesting also in winter: witch hazels begin to blossom in January while the mediterranean plants are waiting for warmer days in the safe warmth of the tropical greenhouse.

• Heralds of spring

• Blooming summer

• Autum in the Garden, falling of leaves, maturing of fruits

• Botanical Garden in winter

• Looking for adventure

4. From the Life of Plants   

Pupils learn about the life of plants. Live plants are used to demonstrate how a young plant grows from the seed, how cotyledons differ from real leaves, how to distingish between monocotyledons and dicotyledons, what are adventitious roots and which are the shapes of leaves. Pupils have a close look at the structure of the flower and its reproductive parts. They can observe pollinators during their work. We discuss with them the importance of different fruit shapes to their disseminators. They learn why plants exude odorous essential oils and how to make a camomile shampoo.

• Reproduction of plants

• Planting - seeds and cuttings

• Plants and their pollinators

• Vegetal organs: roots, stalks, leaves

• Vegetal organs: flower - its structure and tasks

• Pollination

• Fruits and propagation of plants

• Plants, their scent, taste, and significance

• Medicinal herbs

5. Habitats and Geographic Distribution of Plants  

Each bio-association is characterized by the presence of specific plants: blooming meadow plants or floating aquatic plants, carnivorous marshland plants or desert cacti and euphorbias. The rockgarden offers an experience of the high mountain world of fissures and screes, illustrating the ways in which plants have adapted themselves to extreme conditions. The nearby pool is the home of undewater plants and aquatic animals such as pond snails, water striders, frogs and newts, dragonflies ...

• Meadow plants

• Plants and animals of the pool

• Overgrowing of the water surface and overgrowth plants

• Moorland plants and our carnivorous plants

• Desert plants and how they are adapted to the life in desert

• Plants of our Karst

• Plants of the Alpine and pre-Alpine world

• Plants of the Balkan Peninsula

• Mediterranean plants

• Plants of the tropical and subtropical parts of the world

• Ecological conditions of vegetal life

• Interspecies relationships (symbiosis, parasitisms ...)

• Association indices, transection method

6. Trees and Shrubs    

How many trees do we really know by name when taking a walk through a forest? Beech, oak, spruce? What about chestnut, cherry, or else maple, elm, mountain ash, alder, birch? What is the difference between spruce and fir? How to identify a common yew? How trees are classified per leaves? How to prepare a bark imprint and how to recognize a tree by the corresponding bark? And what is it that distinguishes a shrub from a tree?

• Principal arboreal species of our forests (leaves, bark, fruits, environment)

• Shrub species, shrubbery as a habitat

• Hedges and their importance

7. Plant System    

Visitors are invited to take a walk around the flower beds. A great variety of plants grow on each flower bed, yet they all have something in common: their flowers, though of different colours and sizes, have a similar structure, ligneous plants and herbs have leaves of the same shape - here we learn about the great diversity of plant species within the same family. Using simple determination keys pupils can try to determine single plants and find them a proper place in the system. On an advanced level, this topic is recommended to school study-groups.

• Plant system - learning about diversity within single taxonomic categories

• Systematics and evolution

• Ways of determining plants, determination keys, importance of the knowledge on the world of plants

8. Excursions into the Environs of Ljubljana    

Ljubljana is one of the rare capitals in whose immediate surroundings there grow a great variety of plants, ranging from thermophilic plants of Šmarna Gora to cryophilic plants or even glacial relicts of Iški Vintgar, Borovniški Pekel where endemic Carniolan primrose can still be found. Real moorland has survived at Mali Plac and below Rožnik while remains of peat and marshland plants of the former moor are still to be seen at Jurčevo Šotišče. Walking along the Sava river, one can visit wet as well as dry meadows, gravel pits, even meadows rich in orchids - in Europe such meadows are considered most important and therefore enjoy legal protection - riverine forests, groves, aquatic vegetation ... Pupils are encouraged to pay close attention to their immediate surroundings, accept it as their own and develop a protective attitude towards plant species in their natural habitats. While the Botanical Garden provides expert guiding, visiting groups have to organize their own transport to these sites.