Busy gardening week

This was a week of propagation, planting, landscaping and parent help!

In introducing the students to the range of plants that can be grown, both for food and other uses, we moved to root crops (carrots) and brassicas (cabbage and broccoli) and marigolds, which are great in a vegetable garden for repelling pests with their aroma and for the fact that they look great!

It was great to see the students creating paper propagation pots (try saying that quickly three times) to propagate their root crops with little instruction and great care. The garden beds are filling up with our original leafy green seedlings, peas and beans, and the root crops. Even with some really hot weather, the lasagne no dig beds retain their moisture incredibly well and over the next two weeks I'm pretty confident that we should see a sea of green (or something like that!)

We had our first parent volunteer in the garden this week, and what a difference they make. It is something I really need to try to encourage next term as having that extra hand is incredibly helpful to manage a large class in the garden.

Landscaping continues as we look at how the garden will be used and at creating a composting area, which will be critical for the garden into the future to create a truly circular and contained system. We worked on some more terracing, changing the location of a couple of paths and the creation of a great entrance by Alan. All of this 'work' in the garden is hopefully continuing to give the kids a sense of ownership of the space, which is something we really want to achieve.

We have two classes on watering duty each week and another class that are already looking at creating some art work in the garden. We plan to hold our first 'open' afternoon early next term where the community can come and learn a little about permaculture, the lasagne no dig method and our garden.

I think we are on our way to creating the space we dreamt of creating.