A Vision is Taking Shape

The last time I posted on the blog, I was preparing to lead my first lesson in the garden in a long time. In the meantime, that lesson was a blast, then I got busy organizing caretakers for the cool-season veggies the kindergartners planted, and got to go on a meditation retreat. The time and space to come back to the present, to sit in silence, was a welcome respite to the busy-ness of life. It helped me to settle in to the long-haul with both schools I am working with (Tillman Elementary and Nipher Middle), and not worry if I had to let some school garden things go by the wayside in order to maintain balance in my personal life.

While I was away on retreat, another school gardenin' mom was busy helping to organize parent efforts to help with the Tillman's cafeteria composting kick-off for the year. I had a great time when I came back, diving into trashcans and showing kids how to sort their compost/recycling/landfill items after lunch. It's a dirty job, but not many things are more fun! Matter of fact, I'm leaving in a few minutes to go experience this with the kindergartners today:)

This week was full of exciting developments both at Tillman and Nipher. This same parent who was organizing composting also entered Tillman and Nipher into a sustainability in education contest sponsored by the St. Louis chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). Both schools were accepted, and matched with a USGBC member who's a professional somehow related to green building and sustainability. At Tillman, we were matched with Nancy Nafe, a LEED certified landscape architect. At Nipher, it's Michelle Rook, a local architect in town who is going to help us start an after-school composting club that will begin composting in the Nipher cafeteria. Finally, there was also a Tillman sustainability committee visioning session. This group of parents, teachers, and administrators got together to dream big about a vision of sustainability for our school.

I can really start to envision how big changes are going to become a reality here in the Kirkwood Schools. When people aren't afraid to dream big, and are also willing to invest their time, energy, and talents, anything is possible! Below is the email I just sent out to all the people involved in the sustainability group at Tillman, detailing our longterm dreams and short-term goals. It will be a great document to come back to in a few years to see how far we've come!

October 25, 2013
Hi everyone!

I hope this email finds you all well. It has been an exciting week for sustainability at Tillman. Below is an update that encapsulates results from Tuesday afternoon's committee visioning session and a meeting between myself, Jaime Kelley (another parent volunteer heading this up), and Nancy Nafe (a landscape architect serving as Tillman's sustainability mentor for the next 6 months for a contest called Green Schools Quest). The email is the nutshell version, if you want more details, I've included links of meeting notes. As always, please pass this along to interested folks and call me with any questions!

Finally, if you would like to take a leadership role in any of the areas listed below, just contact me. This group is chock-full of passionate people with amazing resources, and we want you to plug in where it suits you best! Some of you have indicated that you want to be "doers", not planners, so for you this is just to keep you up-to-date and in-the-know:)
Lesli @ 314-368-0500

Visioning meeting agenda  https://docs.google.com/document/d/1O58tjs_bAu6zfLcp772yR3OJgKv_R9z9HNuTXBDWn60/edit?usp=sharing

What is sustainability? It’s the ability to meet the needs of the current generation without compromising the needs of future generations. The Iroquois idea of considering impacts of actions to the 7th generation is a great example of this mindset.

Discussion questions

1. In terms of sustainability, where do you want to see Tillman in 10 years?

2. How do we integrate the idea of sustainability with the service learning and character education already happening at Tillman?

3. How to balance student leadership and adult direction as we move toward our goals?

4. How can we support teachers, whose plates are so full already?

Wrap-up Each participant spoke about the sustainability goal that resonated the most with them

This list in bold is what came out as highest priority for question 1 (long-term dreams, not the how-tos) to those in attendance. Until we revise our vision, these are where we will invest most of our energy. It's neat to me that nothing on this list diverges from conversations I've had with folks connected to this committee over the past several months. Even though several of you couldn't make it to the meeting, I think it's likely you'll approve of the current emphasis!

• Getting fresh, local, organic food into cafeteria, whether it be through farmer partnerships, helping change food service procurement practices, or growing food at Tillman
• Assessing school environment and practices for health impact on students (food, air and water quality, opportunity for outdoor time and physical activity--think energy audit, wellness audit, etc.)
• Involvement in food equity (in and beyond Kirkwood, high desire to partner with a community in need)

• Integrating sustainability into curriculum and culture of school

Meeting with landscape architect
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1JAxQ3B4ryTnwEkNg7qmrRkQnUptwNHGmdGTmqM44T9E/edit

• Green Schools Quest is a contest sponsored by the St. Louis Chapter of the US Green Building Council. This program assigns mentors from the professional community to help schools develop and implement a sustainability-related project over the course of about 6 months. In March, we will be required to submit a presentation about our project. If we win, we get cool stuff and some moulah. I think we will win. 
• Our mentor: Nancy Nafe, landscape architect, LEED certified, she recently designed Maplewood-Richmond Heights' new kitchen garden at their high school.
• Our goals for the Quest (some are new, some our committee decided on awhile ago--but this plan includes specific folks to head up different things, and that's in the works!)
• The plan between now and March:
• Increase amount of food we are growing
• Raising awareness about sustainability, "marketing" to students, families, and teachers
• Prairie installation
• Sensory Garden installed near playground
• Visioning sessions with students and adults that will culminate in a long-range landscape design

Lesson planning after a long sabbatical

So it's been about a year since I've worked with kids in the garden. My last year in SoBoCo I ran the after-school program for older elementary kids, so it's been even longer since I worked in the garden with the itty-bitties. Next week I am leading 5 classes of kindergartners in "Planting a Rainbow"--we're planting a few raised beds with a bunch of colorful, cool-season crops. I am totally excited, and more than a little nervous.

I hope they come out of it knowing how to use some garden tools safely and effectively, and that they have some idea of how to gently plant a seed. I think I can do that in a half hour. Short and sweet, that's the aim. I'm wondering if the time is short enough that I should do this in one group, or if we should break into two groups and have an alternate activity for parents to lead while the teacher and I conduct the actual garden lesson. At this point, I'm thinking the whole class plants at once, and we have a fun activity to do if needed after they are done planting. I'll repeat the lesson 5 times in one day, so I'm sure it'll get modified each time--I always feel bad for the first teacher that has to try a lesson with me!

Below is what I've come up with so far for my lesson. Getting ready to send it off for feedback from the kindergarten teacher who is helping get this coordinated. Looking forward to advice from a veteran teacher! If anyone reads this and has ideas for improvement, I'm all ears....

Materials:

• Have beds already prepped, labeled as to what will go in them, and divided in half lengthwise to make it easier for the kids to know where to put their row markers
• Hand trowels
• Popsicle sticks with kids' names on them already (ask teachers to label them and hand them out)--these are labels for the rows so kids can check on "their plants'" progress 
• Seeds
• Watering cans, pre-filled

Garden Lesson (30 minutes)

1. Intro: Who has ever gardened before? How many have had gardens at their house? Grandparents' house? Preschool?  Which season do we usually garden in? Warm or cool weather? Point out the garden where we'll be planting seeds today--planting a rainbow of cool-season vegetables. Vegetables that it's okay to plant when summer is ending, and the weather is turning cooler. Goals for today, that you learn how to plant seeds, and that you learn how to safely use tools in the school garden. Ready? 
2. Away from the beds, circle up and pass out hand trowels. Teach the game "Tools Up!"--if a grownup sees unsafe tool use, we will call out "tools up!" and all kids should check their tools, then hold them vertical (up), but with the pointy, or working, end down. That's it. We can all carry on once everyone is being mindful of their tools. Demonstrate safe/unsafe ways to hold the tool, and how gentle they'll want to be when planting baby seeds. Then pretend to garden and practice doing "tools up".
3. Leave tools there and move to garden. (unless kids have mold or other allergy, we'll use our hands--they're great tools too!) Show layout for what we will be planting where, and have kids decide what they want to plant. Help all kids line up along beds in good spots to plant their seeds. Pass out row markers. Have each student put their marker in the bed, halfway across bed and directly in front of them.
4. Then give each student some seeds, and instruct them to hold onto them until instructed when and where to plant. Have kids compare the size of what they are holding in their hand to others in the group. Some tiny, some bigger. Demo how to plant small seed (no real ditch, just place seeds on top, pat down, sprinkle with some dirt, and pat down again), and bigger seeds (use fingers to create a little ditch for your row, place seeds in, then push soil on top of the ditch, pat down. Do this at the end of the beds, so students can see (we will end up with some crazy mixed-veggie rows, will be fun to see what happens in demo row!). If teachers comfortable with demo, great, we can do two at once in different beds. (5 min)
5. Let the kids plant. Help any that need it with digging a little trench, spacing between bigger seeds, sprinkling carrot seeds, etc.
6. Demo how to use a watering can to gently water the seeds in. If time, help kids water in their row (adult supervision needed here to avoid flooding the seeds away), or just explain that we will water in all the seeds after all the classes have planted today. 
7.  Wrap-up with quick reflection circle. One feeling word about their experience today. (only one word! listen to your classmates!)

Activity if it goes real fast, can let kids join in as they finish:
--Mini-hike using a 3-foot section of string. Find a patch of ground (not in the garden beds), or a plant, and lay string across it. Pretend you're an ant and talk about all you see as you walk along the string. Adults can participate with the kids, small groups. (Deb, Lisa, and Jill--we did this one at the workshop this summer.)

Post Script: I did this lesson almost as written: eliminated some ideas, changed other things around. Bottom line, it went great. Perfect? Nope. Fun and educational? Yep. I had a blast, it seems like the kids and teachers did too. My kiddo helped me plant the few remaining rows after school, which was fabulous--his grade level isn 't participating yet and he was bummed until he got to be my after-school helper. 

Systems thinking

I'm pondering systems thinking and ways to teach it. What about sitting in the school yard and listening to see how many different systems one can observe? You could break it down by senses. What can you hear? What can you see? I'd expect students to be able to hear or see a variety of animal systems (mammals, birds, insects), traffic systems, heating/cooling systems, woodland systems, a classroom system. This could be a great way to introduce the idea of systems to students, and help them see how ubiquitous systems are. 

What would happen if we just let kids explore this and ask questions? Start with systems and let them ask questions to direct us. As teachers we could let them take any system, then help them look for the components of the system and learn to understand the system they are already interested in. Learn to recognize patterns, learn to look for feedback loops (negative ones as well as amplifiers), identify energy flows, learn to look for hubs--points of multiple connections. 

I'm not a teacher (just a parent volunteer), so I don't have a class of my own to try these ideas with. Maybe that's why it is so exciting to me that Tillman elementary is already thinking about systems teaching. I'm not sure to what extent they are already teaching it, but I know that the principal and some of the teachers understand the importance of imparting an understanding of systems. That's why creating a helpful outdoor space is gonna be so transformational. Because the culture of the school is primed to shift right as the outdoor space is being changed, the potential for real and lasting change is great. 

It seems to me that so many teachers are ready and knowledgeable and want to help our kids be able to care for themselves and the planet when theyre grown. And they know that systems thinking is so important for that. 

It gives me so much hope to see how much change there already has been in our society in the last 10 years. When I started this, I never encountered an administrator and very few teachers who thought about "schooling for sustainability". 

Today I find myself in 2 schools helping to coordinate new garden programs and I'm blown away by their readiness to make substantial changes. Schools are such powerful definers of culture. So,  when thinking about what can happen over the next 10 years as many many schools around the country are doing what Tillman and Nipher are, I am filled with hope. And hope, let me tell ya, it makes life a whole lot more fun. 

Gardens, Systems, and the Sustainability Stool

"From the garden, and the kitchen, and the table, you learn empathy--for each other and for all of creation; you learn compassion; and you learn patience and self-discipline. A curriculum that teaches these lessons gives children an orientation to the future--it can give them hope."

-Alice Waters

I haven't visited that quote in awhile. But it speaks so beautifully to what I believe our children need with them when they enter adulthood: empathy and hope.  And it outlines a way to offer those things to our kids while challenging them with rigorous academics.  It's been a decade since I began studying sustainability education and got hooked on school gardens. It seems about time to go back to the basics: What is so great about school gardens anyway? Why is the garden, the kitchen, and the table important in education? I write this post for those unfamiliar with school gardens and all their merits, and for those (like me) who've been doing this school garden thing awhile and could benefit from re-articulating the rationale for our work.

When thinking about the why's of school gardening, if you go at it long enough, you'll probably get back to the most basic education question of all--what is education for? The answers are myriad. Some want to reform the system to empower oppressed peoples, some see the preservation of nature as paramount, some want to make sure our country can compete in the global economy. I'd say all three can be justified. Of course race, class, and gender issues must be addressed in order to ensure equality in education. But what good are we doing if we do not also address the environmental legacy students will inherit? And every last one of us wants our children to be able to make a decent living  when they're grown and share this planet with 8 or 9 billion other humans. 

I've been school gardening long enough that I can say without doubt, that a good garden program can integrate these most basic why's of education. Today, when people talk about sustainability education (of which school gardens are part), many folks include all 3 "legs of the sustainability stool": social systems, ecosystems, and economic systems. School gardens can be a model of sustainability education when they integrate social, ecological, and economic concerns; teach systems thinking; promote dialogue and build community; and empower students to believe in their ability to make changes in the world.

Schools, Gardens, and the Sustainability Stool

If a school garden program includes growing food crops, or even composting from food scraps, the idea of food systems will likely enter the classroom. To understand a food system, you really do have to think about ecosystems, economic systems, and the individual people affected by all our food choices each day. A young elementary gardener may only go as far as understanding that a garden represents an ecosystem, that people, bugs, and weather can all impact that system, and that food costs less when you grow it yourself. But that lays the foundation for a middle schooler to learn about greater complexity within their food system--for example, dialoging about the environmental, health, and economic trade-offs when choosing conventional vs. organic food, or examining the factors contributing to childhood obesity (from food marketing policy to poverty and food access). All the examples above also tie right in to the core curriculum already taught in the classroom--science, math, civics, it goes on and on. School gardens open a door for creative schools to weave the threads of sustainability into the fabric of the existing curriculum.

Systems Thinking

Growing food and creating habitat through school gardening incubates holistic thinking, the ability to examine social and environemtal systems at the same time, the ability to think systemically. Fritjof Capra, founding director of the Center for Ecoliteracy, speaks to this idea:

At the Center for Ecoliteracy, we have experienced that growing a school garden and using it as a resource for cooking school meals is an ideal project for experiencing systems thinking and the principles of ecology in action, and for integrating the curriculum. Gardening reconnects children to the fundamental of food--indeed, to the fundamentals of life--while integrating and enlivening virtually every activity that takes place at a school. 

In the garden, we learn about food cycles and we integrate the natural food cycles into our cycles of planting, growing, harvesting, composting, and recycling. Through this practice, we also learn that the garden as a whole is embedded in larger systems that are again living networks with their own cycles. The food cycles intersect with these larger cycles--the water cycle, the cycle of the seasons, and son on--all of which are linked in the planetary web of life. (Creativity and Leadership in Learning Communities, 1999 p. 7). 

Our world is made up of all kinds of systems, from natural life systems to human-designed systems like communications networks or cities. By grounding students in the understanding of a concrete, defined system like a garden or a compost bin, we prepare them to understand patterns, connections, and feedback loops in increasingly complex, abstract systems they will need to be comfortable with to be good problem-solvers in a global economy. 

Dialogue and Community Building
Gardens make room for conversations. In a garden setting, students naturally talk to and collaborate with one another. They get to know one another, they develop relationships. And relationships are the core strength of a community. Gardening can also be hard work, and gardening in groups builds a sense of community through shared accomplishment. A strong classroom community is beneficial in part because it gives children a sense of belonging, it makes them feel safe--and in order for learning to occur at the optimal level, a child has to feel safe, both physically and emotionally. 

But the community-building doesn't just occur at the classroom level. A school garden brings adults together as well. School garden programs frequently host community work days, and I have seen the magic of these many times. Hands down, I'd rather work in a garden with total strangers than attend a cocktail party with them. In a garden, we are given tasks alongside which conversations naturally spring up. At a dinner party, there are awkward silences! Additionally, a community garden connects people from all walks of life (rich, poor, liberal, conservative, protestant, pagan, black, brown, or white), and helps broaden our mental picture of who's a part of our community. And that, very simply and naturally, is transformative.   

Empowerment

Sustainability. A big word, a stool that has to hold a lot of weight. A heavy burden on our children, who know a lot about the world's complex problems at a young age. How can we ease their burden a little bit? By showing them how to make positive changes in their corner of the world, and gardening can do this in spades. 

As kids develop, their understanding of and feelings of connection to the world expand outward. In elementary school, kids' concrete thinking and very localized sense of community dovetails wonderfully with a garden on the school grounds. Young children experience that their actions matter when they grow food for themselves, their school, or their community. The students in Southern Boone schools love the Learning Garden, and they feel proud of helping to maintain a space that is changing their town and school for the better. And this past spring, when the student farmers' market booth brought in over $500 that will help sustain the garden program, you bet those elementary students felt full of enthusiasm and hope. 

As kids mature, their ability to act within a larger or more complex system grows. Middle school students can start to understand the food system in which their school operates. Perhaps they grow a garden, but maybe they participate in Farm to School or learn how to advocate for healthier food options in their community. High schoolers could run a business, write grants, do significant research--so many ways connected to gardens, food systems, and schools for students to practice positive community impact. And it's through acting in the world that humans, children as well as adults, come to believe in our remarkable power to create positive change. And how wonderful that this transformative empowerment can begin with the simple act of planting a seed. 

 

Planning at Tillman Elementary

 Today the garden committee met with the Garden Coordinator from Maplewood-Richmond Heights School District, Melissa Breed-Park. What a fount of knowledge and experience she is! We toured the grounds with her, detailing our hopes for this year as well as some long-range dreams for the schoolyard. Below is a first look at some top priorities. 

Principal Lisa Greenstein greeting MRH School District's
Garden Coordinator, Melissa Breed-Park
 





A view of the future prairie (Shhhh! Don't tell the kids yet, it's a surprise!)

The rest of the pictures are from the opposite of the building from the prairie and playground, in the courtyard. This small, sheltered, enclosed space is a perfect jumping off point. It's a small space, so makes designing a bit more manageable. Two water spickets (!), easy access from inside and out, and it offers both sun and shade. In addition to the seating we requested, Melissa got us thinking about growing veggies and fruit, housing our tools, making compost, and installing a wash station--all in this amazing space! See below for the "before shots" of the courtyard. I have a feeling it's going to look a lot different this time next year...




Plenty of existing pathways

This spot gets lots of sun...bring on the veggie gardening!

White barrels on right are first iteration of school compost bins,
will likely be phased out in favor of a 3-bin system with more capacity

View from inside the courtyard looking out
 



As you leave the courtyard, you see the 3 raised beds (on left) that are ready for planting this fall.
So glad we can jump right in and do something even before the grander vision takes shape!

 

 

I'll add more details about today's visit and the history of Tillman's garden committee soon, but wanted to get some pics on the blog asap!

 

Grocery Store Angst

I watched a Jamie Oliver clip last week. About ground beef and the ammonia used in 70% of this country's ground beef to keep it "clean". I'd seen the pink slime video awhile back as well. I find Oliver's passion for and commitment to healthy eating inspiring. And, right or wrong, I react viscerally to his dramatic visuals--I'm not claiming here to have done any personal research into ammonia or pink slime. They just freak me out.

Ammonia in our beef

So, my commitment to choosiness when buying meat was pretty high when I went grocery shopping yesterday. Ground beef was on my list, and I didn't have time to go to the farmers' market. Walking past the meat section, I noticed they had some "ground in-house" beef. Emboldened by knowledge of ammonia, I pointed to it and asked about that. The butcher confirmed that they ground it in-house, but looked askance as he did so. Hmmm. So, what cuts of meat do you use, I asked? Turns out, they empty out tubes of coarse-ground lean beef, run it through their grinder for a finer rendering, and call it ground in-house. The higher fat version can more honestly be said to be made in-house--they grind up the fatty trimmings from meat they butcher on-site. Damn. Not what I wanted to hear.

What to do? Well, I walked away from the butcher and threw a package of veggie crumbles (soy-based fake ground beef) in my cart. I don't love this option either. I'm sure I'll write about my soy conundrum someday, but my neighbor is on her way to take me to the farmers' market and I need some ground beef. Thankful to have a farmers' market nearby, thankful to have the means to shop there, and thankful to have time to cook healthy food for my family. But what about those who have to buy ammonia-laced pink slime because it's fast and it's cheap, and they have little time or money?

Blogging and Gardening, Take 2

Seven years ago I found myself in a new town, new home, and decided to try my hand at writing. That didn’t last long as I soon found myself too busy with two new babies--a bouncing baby boy and a brand new school garden project. Family and community life took precedence over capturing interests and learning on paper. Today I find myself in a new town, new home, with another new school garden project. My baby boy is in first grade with a brother in high school. The first school garden I helped develop is all grown up and has become a leader in the region (The Southern Boone Learning Garden). I want to try this writing thing again.

I’ve been reflecting a lot lately on my the similarities and differences between the two garden projects, and what my role is and should be in this second iteration as a result. I’ve only been working for a few months with folks here in Kirkwood, but one thing that is strikingly different on this second project is just how many people were already thinking and working on a similar vision (or at least open to it) when I came on the scene.

In 2013, I am finding many more people that hold a vision of healthy kids, healthy communities, and a healthy environment via school gardens/outdoor ed. The administrators and teachers I meet want kids to understand how systems work so they can tackle complex problems they will face in the future. They want kids to have opportunity for service and for real-life problem solving, and they know that getting kids outdoors and teaching them about gardening and composting will benefit students in myriad ways. I don’t know if that’s due to the fact that the school garden movement has come so far and truly impacted thinking on a large scale since I started this work in 2007, or if I just lucked out. I do know that I am excited and humbled to be a part of some great things happening in my part of the world, and I am thrilled to have the chance to document the process and share it with others.

Similarities:

• Supportive administration--so important, and have been lucky in this way both times around
• Teacher time constraints--so much on their plates, but gardens are such a great way for teachers to “buy back” time by integrating subjects
• Kids’ enthusiasm! They love it, and it’s why so many of us get hooked on school gardens. Who can resist when a child finds a big potato ready for harvest and joyfully shouts, “I’ve hit the jackpot!” I’ve yet to meet that person.

Some differences between Southern Boone and Kirkwood:

• Rural (Ashland)  vs. urban/suburban (Kirkwood)

• Small school district to medium one
• Bedroom community (harder to find school-day volunteers available) with not that many stay-at-home parents to a district with many parents able to volunteer
• More resource constraints in Southern Boone School District than Kirkwood
• Less obesity in Kirkwood than Southern Boone (This is surprising to some. counterintuitive that folks in rural areas have less access to healthy lifestyle contributors like sidewalks, large grocery stores with high quality produce, fitness centers, shorter commute times)