SCHOOLYARD GARDENS:
(expansion of existing programs)
GOALS: To inspire students to become participants in their education
and active contributors to their community through gardening.
The Schoolyard Garden is a creative program that makes a student�s
education relevant, practices sustainable living, gives the school community
a nurturing aesthetic, and opens the door for countless learning experiences
that children will benefit from and remember in the years to come.
The best kind of learning is the type that combines real experiences with
the curriculum. The Schoolyard Garden will make a education relevant
by becoming a social and scientific reference point that children need in
order to combine the concepts we want them to learn (theory) with
demonstrating their knowledge (practice). Students will learn a seemingly
endless variety of concepts like food webs, sustainability and even
business concepts like supply and demand. Best of all our students will
learn these things by doing them.
An essential aspect of this program is the design process. Students will
be involved in design exercises that emphasize craft. This process will
empower students by allowing them to create high quality places that
will transform a small part of their community. Students will be building
and planting something they imagined. They also get an opportunity to
be a part of the whole process of creating, designing, planting, constructing
and maintaining.