Our Veggie Garden has 10 existing 4 feet x 8 feet raised beds. We are in the process of realigning the beds to accommodate 4 new beds. Pavers will be laid between and around each bed to help keep grass out. We are excited about the new growing space that will be added. Our friends, Jim Long, www.longcreekherbs.com and Renee Shepard , http://www.reneesgarden.com/about/index.htm , are helping us brew up the magic that will be growing in them soon!.
We have a local artist that is going to work with our students on painting signs that label objects in all three of our outdoor classrooms. We want to create a vocabulary rich environment for our students. The gardens provide lots of opportunity for vocabulary development ! We will post pictures soon !
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Saturday, February 12, 2011
kids in the greenhouse
This will be our second year growing from seed in our school greenhouse. All 500 plus of our students will plant something that will be sold at our 2nd Annual Health, Wellness and Environmental Studies Magnet School Plant Sale ! A great deal of Arkansas is considered rural with an abundance of farm land. Most would think our kids are exposed to the outdoors because of being in a rural/farming area. Our school is located in the town of Jonesboro, which has the population of 67,000. A large percentage of our students live in apartment complexes and subdivisions that limit opportunities to grow their own gardens and more sadly, to even have the opportunity to play in a yard, dig in the dirt or climb a tree.
In Richard Louv's book Last Child in The Woods, he notes that today's children are becoming increasingly disconnected from the natural world. Their experiences in the outdoors are limited for several different reasons. In a sense, they are robbed from an education that nature provides. I found this to be true when working in our school gardens and greenhouse. It was hard for me to fathom seeing children that didn't know how to dig in the dirt. It was foreign to them. One day I took a group a kids that were 8 and 9 year olds to the greenhouse to do some planting of seeds in flats. As soon as we walked in, a little boy inhaled deeply smelling the smells of the greeenhouse and said "awwwww dirt !", like I would say "awwww fudge brownies!".
This is our third year to have a school garden in raised beds and our second year to grow in the greenhouse. It is surreal to garden with kids. They discover. They ask questions. They learn. There are wonderful educational tools and authors that are tapping into creating educational literature and activities that teachers can use to teach science, math, social studies and language arts skills in the garden.
Our school is very unique to have created three outdoor classrooms from existing courtyards that were not being utilized. We have taken it a step further by creating a student kitchen from our former cafeteria kitchen. We have found that kids are much more willing to taste something that they have grown.
We will happily be busy working in the greenhouse trying to get a jump start on Spring ! We will keep you posted on what pops up.
In Richard Louv's book Last Child in The Woods, he notes that today's children are becoming increasingly disconnected from the natural world. Their experiences in the outdoors are limited for several different reasons. In a sense, they are robbed from an education that nature provides. I found this to be true when working in our school gardens and greenhouse. It was hard for me to fathom seeing children that didn't know how to dig in the dirt. It was foreign to them. One day I took a group a kids that were 8 and 9 year olds to the greenhouse to do some planting of seeds in flats. As soon as we walked in, a little boy inhaled deeply smelling the smells of the greeenhouse and said "awwwww dirt !", like I would say "awwww fudge brownies!".
This is our third year to have a school garden in raised beds and our second year to grow in the greenhouse. It is surreal to garden with kids. They discover. They ask questions. They learn. There are wonderful educational tools and authors that are tapping into creating educational literature and activities that teachers can use to teach science, math, social studies and language arts skills in the garden.
Our school is very unique to have created three outdoor classrooms from existing courtyards that were not being utilized. We have taken it a step further by creating a student kitchen from our former cafeteria kitchen. We have found that kids are much more willing to taste something that they have grown.
We will happily be busy working in the greenhouse trying to get a jump start on Spring ! We will keep you posted on what pops up.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Garden Clean Up
We have taken advantage of a few beautiful days to clean up the gardens. While doing so, we noticed new sprigs of mint popping up and the tips of our tulips and jonquils pushing through the soil ! Next week we are going to tackle a major reorganization of the greenhouse. Big job, but big fun !
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Monday, January 17, 2011
Gardening and Cooking with children in school
Health, Wellness and Environmental Studies Magnet School is located in Jonesboro, Arkansas. The school serves 580 students in grades 1st- 6th. We are unique in the fact that we have fully equipped student kitchen, three outdoor classrooms featuring an outdoor kitchen, vegetable garden, sensory garden and "critter" courtyard. Our journey began 4 years ago when our district transformed our elementary schools into themed schools. Health, Wellness and Environmental Studies (HWES) goal was to create a garden to kitchen theme to promote a hands on approach to educating our students.
This blogging adventure is from the suggestion of a new friend, Jim Long. Our blog will be an on going learning process and project of our Gifted and Talented students in grades 3rd-6th. They will be posting our garden and kitchen news and pictures from our school. Join us as we take our journey through our school gardens ! Come grow with us !
This blogging adventure is from the suggestion of a new friend, Jim Long. Our blog will be an on going learning process and project of our Gifted and Talented students in grades 3rd-6th. They will be posting our garden and kitchen news and pictures from our school. Join us as we take our journey through our school gardens ! Come grow with us !
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