Colour

It felt like a summer day in the garden.
Harvesting root and leaf crops, taking in the wonderful colours.

I keep thinking of the possibilities of this thing.
Worm farms, planting guilds with perennial and fruit crops.
A science lab for discovery.
A workable indigenous garden just down the path.
But more than that;
How it can change attitudes.
How it can create ideas.
How it is such a fantastic place to sit and be still.

How we need to grow more peas!

Says it all really.

Life in a School Garden

Photos from the last couple of weeks. Harvesting and eating, composting and planting.

Hot composting

 Cutting up nitrogen rich greens for compost

 Harvest. Simple

Prep

Handmade pasta

Salad

 Pesto

Steaming

Plate

Flower fruit

Eat and be merry

The plants they are a grow'n in the school vegetable garden. We have been the chief supplier of the canteen with our lettuce, the radishes and beetroots are producing the goods and the peas are going great guns (although not quite fast enough to feed the ravenous hordes that first enter the garden on a Tuesday morning (do no children have breakfast these days?!)

Last week was a big step for the garden, which I have decided to call simply, the outdoor classroom (more on that later), for last week, we were cooking with gas, quite literally. A two stove gas cooker was the centrepiece of the garden as the students cooked using much of the fresh produce only metres away.

For the Stage 2 and 3 students, it was Silver beet Omelette with a leafy green salad, while the younger children put together a Basil Pesto with Fettucini  Pasta.

Silver beet Omelette

Simply collecting the Silver beet from the garden, two leaves was plenty and adding them to about 6 eggs (Free Range), 50 ml of milk and a pinch of salt. Simply whisk together and place in a frying pan. Some groups experimented with Kale leaf and flat leaf parsley to add to the Silver beet, both of which added a nice 'tang' to the omelette.

The groups who put together the salad raided the Cos Lettuce, as well as Mizuna, Basil, Kale, and Marigold flowers.

Empty plates speak for themselves.

The great thing about omelettes (as well as pike lets and the like) is that you can adapt them to suit what is in season in the garden. Tomatoes are ripening, beautiful tomato omelette. Got some onions to pull up? Add that to the omelette, and so on.

Basil Pesto Fettucini 

Stage 1 students worked together to prepare a Basil Pesto, to add to some Fettucini. The Pesto is simple to make, just add to following to a blender;

Few good size handfuls of fresh basil

3 gloves of garlic

Juice of one lemon

About 80g of parmesan cheese

Good glug of Olive Oil.

Usual pesto recipes include nuts, but being a school, that's a no go, and really, this recipe is tops without it.

Blend it all together, slowly adding the oil until you get the desired consistency. If you have young kids and they say it looks like 'bad vomit', then you have it about right. Well that's what the Stage 1 kids thought it looked like.

Again, the great thing about this is that you can jar the pesto and keep for quite some time. Simply stir the desired amount through your pasta.

So after some careful measuring and loud blending, it was ready to add to our Fettucini and feed some hungry students. It was interesting to hear the students talk about the tastes they experienced. Some could really taste the basil, others the garlic. All concluded it was 'Yum'!

During these 'meals' I'm trying to give the kids some understanding of the process of harvesting, preparing, serving, eating and cleaning. WIth each child playing their part in producing a nutritious meal for each other. This of course begins way back in those first session where we prepared the soil to nourish our plants. 

... and there is always cleaning up to be done!

It is an exhausting week when we eat, with lots to prepare, and lots of running around during the sessions, but with the help of our wonderful parent, Sharon, I think the discussions the children have about 'doing this at home' and 'loving the food' and of course the smiles on their faces, make it all well and truly worth it.

Eat and be merry indeed!

Salads and composting

Gardens can give you time.
Sometimes.
Things grow. Somethings grow well, others not so.
The school garden has been a place of pleasure for the local Cabbage Moths. A fact not enjoyed by our cauliflower and broccoli. Apart from that, the peas are coming along well, we are harvesting Cos lettuce, flat leaf parsley and interesting greens like Mizuna.

Speaking of leafy greens, throw these into a bowl and add a simple olive oil and lemon dressing and you have a fresh, just picked salad. We have even harvested enough for the canteen to use for their lunches.

We have organised a composting system at the side of the garden. A series of spaces, separated by tin panelling will house our heaps. Turning each week and then moving to the next space so hopefully by the fourth move the compost will be ready for the garden. It's great for the students to see the process of harvesting, eating, composting scraps and then eventually putting it back into the garden to grow more food. Next week Dan will be back to teach some classes about composting practises and creating some worm farms, so we should be well on the way to being able to compost much of the school's food waste.

So the garden grows and at times the management of class after class, keeping students engaged and learning, can make you feel that there is never enough time.

Perhaps it is worth teaching the students (and reminding yourself) about the art of slow. Just sitting and enjoying this space and contemplating what we have done.

Grow.

Harvest Time

Food Ready

The final week in the garden for the term and it was a time for reflection and celebration for a busy and rewarding first term. The older students have done a great job of putting together their presentations on the garden using the i movie software on their iPads. Although I get a little stressed having iPads wondering through the garden in the hands of enthusiastic kids, the way the students can put together really professional and engaging presentations in such a short time, while really enjoying the experience, is a huge plus. 

We had short presentations focusing on the lasagne no dig method, on different plants we have propagated or sown, and on the methods used to create paper propagation pots. Great narration, some lovely music and informative titles led to some great results.

The Kindy classed observed different plants within the garden and then learnt how to carefully harvest some leafy greens to create a simple green salad. Early next term will be the time to really harvest these greens but it was worth allowing the youngest children in the school to celebrate their last day in the garden for the term with some fresh food! We looked at the different leaf types and different flavours, from a Cos lettuce to the Mazuni green, which has a lovely peppery flavour and a real kick. The children were encouraged to give everything a try and most really got into trying some things they had never eaten before. It was fantastic to see the enjoyment they had with what will most likely be our simplest 'meal' from the garden. 

So we take a breath over the two week break. We have parent help to water, I'll be getting into some more landscaping to set up the composting area and some more garden beds, and researching on signage an garden art. There is also a rumour that we will be in for some decent rain.

Great for the garden, not so great for our family camping trip!

Harvesting

Freshly picked food

Garden and IPads

IPad, meet seedling

With only two more weeks until the end of term the focus this week turned to purposeful plants and reflecting on the term that was.

Dan Bakker shared with the students a range of plants whose uses move beyond nutrition. From Aloe Vera plants to sooth skin, mint for a refreshing tea, banana tree leaves for plates, to rushes for baskets. There are so many different uses for a variety of plants and it is important that students get a sense of the range of incredible uses.

The final plant the students were shown was the humble garlic, which is not only great as a healthy way of warding off a cold, but acts as a wonderful insect repellent (that’s for the insects we do not want in our garden). So it was off to plant garlic cloves throughout the garden. Sharon (our wonderful parent help) even had enough time with some classes to propagate some beets in our paper pots.

As we approach the end of term, I wanted to have the students capture some of their experiences in the garden. And what better way to do this in an engaging way than to use the IPads we have available. We discussed some of the things we have done in the garden, from landscaping to paper propagation pots, and discussed how we could capture some images to share our understanding. It was great to see the students focussing hard on capturing each image and also wanting to take photos of them having fun in the garden!

That’s what we want to see in the garden, kids enjoying themselves!

Planting continues 

Useful Plants

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.

Planting begins

After creating our garden beds last week using the "no dig" lasagne method. This week saw the beginning of planting. The students opened up the bed down to the newspaper, then using a soil mixture of mushroom compost and clay road base, they fill the hole they have created. placing the seedling down, they then use a little more of the soil mixture around the seedling to 'bed it down'. Then it's time to water with some molasses.

The kids showed such great care with their plantings, delicately placing their seedlings into their bed, and then enjoying watering their plants, and themselves.

We have planted out some leafy greens; mixed lettuce, cos lettuce, parsley, mizury, and silver beet. And as the Kindy class walked out of the garden waving goodbye to their freshly planted seedlings, you couldn't get the smile off my face!

Our broad beans and peas that we propagated a couple of weeks ago have done incredibly well, being looked after in one of the classrooms. After a few days in filtered light, they will go into the beds next week. There are also plenty of little jobs to be done, as we continue to work on the landscaping in areas and get our resources together.

Fun times in the garden.

Care

Watering

The beds are created

This week was another busy one in the school garden. Students came in and transformed their piece of dirt into a garden bed using the 'lasagne method' of no dig gardening. It's a pretty simple method of building up the bed with a lot layers of good stuff, which will decompose down into even better stuff as the seedlings grow. Ok, not very scientific, but you get my drift.

The first layer is of course, the dirt. We are lucky to be growing on some great soil. Next comes a thick layer of newspapers, which a watered, creating a paper mache effect, which should stop any rouge grass or weeds from seeing the light of day. Then it's a thick layer of Hay, then mushroom compost, another layer of Hay. Then it's time to gather round and sprinkle on some molasses and then some dolomite. Molasses is a by product of the refinement of sugarcane or grapes. It promotes microbial activity. Dolomite is added to lower the acidity of the garden bed and add some magnesium for the joy of our little seedlings, which are due to be planted the following week.

We finished off each session with the students 'planting' the boxes we created the previous week. As the cardboard breaks down, they will become part of the whole garden bed.

We will plant the seedlings within a 'cylinder' of a mix of mushroom compost and road base (yes, we use the road base to lower the acidity of the compost). The young seedlings' roots take in all the goodness from this initial layer. Meanwhile the rest of the bed starts to do it's thing, breaking down to be ready for the plants' roots to be searching beyond the initial compost, towards even more goodness.

Over the coming weeks, we will see how successful it will be.

Next week, we plant leafy greens.

Sprinkling of dolomite goodness

The Garden takes shape

I'm pretty tired as I write this, having finished an exhausting yet really fulfilling day in the school garden during our busy bee. We had a great turnout, with about 25 parents, along with their children turning up. The big number meant we got a lot done but also meant we had to work hard at keeping everyone busy with jobs. There is nothing worse than giving up your time on the weekend and then standing around with nothing to do!

Dan Bakker, from Bournda Environmental Education Centre and Permaculture guru designed the garden and was busy all day explaining to people what his vision was. The sloping site will mean that the garden will have plenty of interest, but it also means a more difficult landscaping challenge to begin with. Dan had some great ideas, using recycled and cheap materials to create a really usable garden that has a key component in any school, flexibility. In fact, if you wanted to (we hopefully will not), your could pick everything up and place it somewhere else- it is all movable.

The three main jobs for the day were creating the main retaining wall, which allows for the terrace approach to the slope, setting out, lining up and digging in the sleepers used to mark out the garden beds and create a few simple benches for the students to use.

Using sheets of tin and star pickets covered with 2 inch polypipe, a cheap, simple and really effective retaining wall can be put together in an hour or so. And because tin can be easily bent and cut, we could use that to 'dig in' the steps down to the lower garden. We had three dads who decided this was going to be their job, and they did a fantastic job.

Many hands, light work

 Tin retaining wall, showing the 'bent in' step.

Job well done!

Setting out the sleepers really gave instant shape to the garden. The slope of the sight meant that getting levels right was pretty time consuming, but we made great headway, enough to be ready for the students next week.

 Top garden beds taking shape

Another one of Dan's great ideas was the use of brick pallets to create simple benches for the students to use to do things like propagate and sort seeds. Getting pallets of the same dimension donated meant that it didn't take long for a team to put together a few benches. Next step is to cut a couple of circles in the top for some basins and fill in the gaps with a bit of timber.

Recycled brick pallets make simple, easy to assemble benches

It was a great day and so exciting to see the garden taking shape. Next week sees the students putting in the layered garden beds, ready for the planting of some leafy vegetable seedlings the following week. 

Then this garden will really start to look special.

Outdoor Classroom

Almost there

Planning... the garden of your dreams

Almost half way through the term and we are still a week away from setting up the landscaping to get the school garden operational. It's exciting to think that in two weeks we will have completely transformed a relatively barren area into a productive food garden. There seems to be a real interest from parents about the garden, with many saying they will be there for the landscaping busy bee. It should be a great atmosphere, with good coffee, cake and even a bbq to keep the workers feed and watered!

We haven't been idle though while we wait for the big push. Students have been doing their own garden designs. They have looked at the site and created designs with consideration of the buildings and land. It has been great to see some of the ideas come out and has led to some discussions on pretty advanced areas like crop rotation, aquaponic systems and soil composition. 

We have also carried out sessions where the students created there own 'paper pot', filled it with soil mixture and planted a pea or broad bean. We hope that these will germinate in time to plant into the garden in two weeks. Since we made about 180 over two days, there should be plenty to use!

The paper pots are really simple to make, use a cheap material which will decompose (paper) and work as really effective pots. Using a rolled up card as the template (about the size of a large toilet paper roll), you simply roll a 15cm wide strip of newspaper around it, making sure there is an overhang on one end. With this overhang you fold it in (this is the base of the pot) and then press down using a round glass jar. Fill with soil and get planting!

Students placing their paper pots into the box, ready for watering.

I was worried that taking so long to get materials and resources together to set up the landscaping day would mean that the kids would lose interest, as each week they would see the same old grass on the garden site. I think we have managed to keep them engaged with some pretty cool hands on science and gardening. Next stop, No Dig Garden methods...

Let the gardening begin!

I have two days each week at the local Primary School, taking classes while their teachers are given planning time. There has been a real push to develop a kitchen garden in the school, and I have been given the opportunity to take on the project with both hands. The above shots are the site we are to use. It has a great northerly aspect, close water supply and is relatively protected from the wind. You can see the flat section at the top of the garden, with a slop heading towards the staff car park. We will make use of the slope by creating terraces, so all in all we should have enough area to create a pretty productive garden.

The planning phase has been a relatively slow process, but in a few weeks time, we will invite the school community to a busy bee, where, hopefully the landscaping will be completed, ready for a series of lessons where the students create 'no-dig' garden beds and then plant a range of seedlings. The plan is, that within a day, the garden will come to life!

I've been doing plenty of reading on permaculture principles and school garden examples and ideas, and over the next few weeks I'll share them on here. It is great stuff and I'm really excited about creating something from not much at all. Already it has forced me to make decision, even though I am concerned what others may think, learn new things, bring a team of people together and solve problems- and we haven't really even begun!

So, a new tag for the blog- Gardening.

To be continued...