Garden Garbage

Today we had our final classes of the week come out and fufill the mission of mixing up their very own compost "soup". I was relieved to take the bananna peels, apple cores, left over cucumber, and old coffee grinds that have been saved up and filling up my dorm's mini fridge for the past week out to the garden. Our students got down and dirty and loved mixing up the yucky stuff with the newspaper shreds. One of todays highlights were all the "rollie-pollie" bugs in the compost pile. The kids loved watching the little critters travel throughout the pile, decomposing the different matriels.

I'm not sure if it was the brisk morning air or the fact that it's Friday or maybe they are still weening off of their Halloween candy, but whatever the case is, the students were a little antsy today so we did a round of Simon-Says "Garden Style" and went over different plants by "Simon says point at the cucumbers" and "Simon says, on the count of 3, what color is the eggplant?".

Continuing on our breaks between classes to keep the garden looking loved for and cleaned up, Alina and I got another load of mulch to continue around the beds, we pulled some weeds in the 3 Sisters Garden, moved the excess tomato plants to the front bed, thinned out some of the kale, and watered all the new additions.

I think the most rewarding part of this job is when you know the students have really learned something. One of the students readily pointed out as he was leaving the garden today that the mushrooms growing in the field would be perfect to through in the compost pile. There is an old Chinese proverb that says “Tell me and I'll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I'll understand.” Out in the garden, we are all about the hands on learning experiance. Today I had a student tell me that 'The Garden' is his favorite teacher. How cool is that?! By being part of this garden, the students learn through their 5 senses about the world around them.