Integrating Hoop House Construction and Operation into an Undergraduate General Education Horticulture Class

Abstract

We integrated the construction and operation of hoop houses into a general education course to provide students with basic agriculture skills such as basic agricultural construction, greenhouse crop production, and greenhouse environmental data collection, while immersing them in an experiential learning environment. Students in the class constructed three 12 × 15-ft hoop houses, installed an irrigation system and climate data acquisition system, and grew radish (Raphanus sativus ‘Cherry Belle’) and lettuce (Lactuca sativa ‘Black-Seeded Simpson’) within each hoop house. At the end of the exercise, 86% of students agreed that they knew the basic techniques of hoop house construction, and 89% agreed that they understood the practical application of building a hoop house. More instruction on calculating crop fertilizer requirements would benefit students because only 43% of students agreed or strongly agreed that they understood how to compute crop fertilizer requirements. Climate data demonstrated that air temperature within the unvented hoop houses exceeded the optimal growing temperature for lettuce and radish. We conclude that construction and operation of hoop houses provided practical agricultural skills in an experiential learning environment while revealing subject areas that warrant further instruction.

Introduction to Horticulture (HORT 100G) at New Mexico State University (NMSU) is a four credit hour, general education course that provides an introduction to the physical, biological, and chemical principles underlying plant growth and development in managed ecosystems (NMSU, 2007). Students complete laboratory exercises that complement principles covered in lectures. Enrollment in HORT 100G averages 50 students, and horticulture majors typically represent 25% of the class. The class meets for three 50 min lectures and one 2-h laboratory each week. Each of three laboratory sections has 15 to 17 students, with a teaching assistant (TA) assigned to each laboratory section.

At NMSU, instruction in HORT 100G routinely requires laboratory activities in a greenhouse setting, but detailed instruction on greenhouse operation and management is reserved for an upper division course, Greenhouse Management (HORT 488). Regardless of the class level, it is often impractical to construct a greenhouse as a class activity. With the average cost of a greenhouse ranging from $10/ft² to $15/ft², teaching institutions might find it financially prohibitive to build a greenhouse as a class exercise. The resulting lack of hands-on...