In the Hopeful Garden: 2017

Friday, July 28, 2017

What's growing?!

It's summer & I have some time to tend the garden, clean out the sheds & plan for classes and garden planting for the coming school year. Planning a school garden is different from planning a home garden or a farm. I want the plants to be exciting and interesting and beautiful to the students; Ideally I want to be able to plan multiple lessons around each plant; I want some plants to be familiar and some to be surprising; I want hearty plants that can recover when kids bump into them or step on them accidentally!

Here are some of the choices I made this year:

Gourds!
This year we planted three types of gourds -- Apple gourds, Corsican gourds & Speckled Swan gourds. We'll use these gourds once they've matured and dried, to make birdhouses, bowls and musical instruments. Gourds have been discovered in archaeological sites dating from as early as 13,000 BC, and their history of uses over time and cultures is fascinating. They make great teaching tools & the seeds are big & perfect for little hands to plant. The vining plants have grown well over our garden tunnel & the gourds look so cool as they hang down into the tunnel.

Cherry Tomatoes!
This winter we planted six varieties of cherry tomatoes -- cherry tomatoes of different sizes & shapes, colors & tastes. Cherry tomatoes are great in a school garden -- sweet, small & perfect for kids to pick and eat right off the vine. We use them to make salsa & salads, too!

Citrus Bird Feeders

Citrus season brings taste tests, snacks, lemonade making & fresh oj in the garden. With 450 enthusiastic students, our dozen little citrus trees don't stay full very long, though. Here's a sweet project for the last of the citrus -- the bitter oro blanco grapefruit and super sour Eureka lemons that don't get a lot of taste bud love.

First graders scooped out the citrus flesh from the halved fruits, then used the peel shells to make bird feeders for our garden. Some kids even munched on the scooped fruit!

Using plastic needles, the students helped each other thread twine through the citrus shells to make hangers for their feeders. Then they helped each other hang the feeders from the branches of our apple and plum trees. This was a fun, sweet activity... and I loved seeing the teamwork and communication that emerged as students made sure everyone succeeded!

Real Work

Fourth graders work on top of the mulch pile

Managing the care of a one-acre school garden can be daunting. I love this work, and that makes it easier, but I certainly can't do it alone. Volunteer work days in our garden help keep things in order from season to season, and help tackle projects too big for one person... and bring together awesome people from our community -- and I'm so thankful for that support. However, I've struggled with how to incorporate the students in the general care and upkeep of our garden -- their garden. It's hard incorporating 25 enthusiastic children in a work project in the garden without any other adult support (even with additional support it can be a challenge!). Students do help plant seeds, water plants, harvest... but what about bigger jobs like mulching, weeding, turning compost, building structures. How do I get them ALL involved?

Well, this school year I decided to make it happen. And it has been chaotic. And joyful. And overall, a phenomenal success. Students LOVE working. They truly enjoy doing hands on, meaningful tasks, and seeing a project's impact in the garden. I frequently explain to visitors and other teachers that it might not look pretty -- it really is chaos... but I'm embracing it, and it's been good. I see my students working together and problem solving, working hard --using their hands, their muscles, their minds. And yes, I see them arguing and struggling, getting dirty and sometimes making poor choices -- it's part of the process.

Take a look at some of the things fourth graders have been up to: