Showing posts with label gardening club. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gardening club. Show all posts
Sunday, 12 June 2011
Wednesday, 13 May 2009
School grounds weekend
So, despite me having a VERY bad back, I and Compostman spent the weekend at school helping to extend the veg garden...Compostgirl just had fun playing with all the other children of parents who had come to help :-) We spent time extending the garden and clearing out the sheds etc....we had a skip delivered and spent a lot of time as well sorting out stuff to go into the recycling skips..and I must admit I "acquired" a lot of "useful" stuff to bring home to use ...(oops)
This is what the garden looked like before the fence was moved....
The fence has been moved out to extend the veg plot by about a further third ...
New fence posts going in....
Rabbit proof netting going in...
Lo! See the new fence! , the new raised bed! , the extra compost bins! I am soooo happy at the extra space and the new stuff it will allow me to do with the children!
Oh...the children are going to have SO much fun growing stuff in the extra space...
This is what the garden looked like before the fence was moved....
The fence has been moved out to extend the veg plot by about a further third ...
New fence posts going in....
Rabbit proof netting going in...
Lo! See the new fence! , the new raised bed! , the extra compost bins! I am soooo happy at the extra space and the new stuff it will allow me to do with the children!
Oh...the children are going to have SO much fun growing stuff in the extra space...
Tuesday, 5 May 2009
Eco Club plant stall at Blossomtime event
Sunday I got up early ish and did the hens, watered the polytunnel plants etc before starting to load up the car with plants.
Lovely trees waiting to be bought!
Mmmm salads, tomatos, beans, peas, aubergines, peppers, herbs...all waiting to go to new homes.
I did 3 trips to the village hall and then set up my table, along with a trestle table kindly provided for me, outside the hall and laid out the stall.
Sue joined me at 1.30 and we made ready for the flood of people coming for the start of the cider tasting in the hall. We had the plants to sell and had designed and written a Family Nature trail as well to sell. This was a sheet with a map of a walk across the fields from the village hall to Aylton Church and the wonderful, newly refurbished Court Barn, with 20 things to spot along the way. We had all had fun the previous Sunday doing this walk and getting the clues sorted out!
Business was very brisk on the plant stall, we sold lots of plants and I was very busy giving advice on how to grow the various veg plants to people who hadn't grown much stuff before but wanted to start growing, which I found very encouraging! We had grown a lot of heritage varieties and these went very quickly, especially the tomato plants and salads.
We also had a lot of general interest shown about Eco Club and Gardening Club, and of course lots of children from the school live locally so came up to look at "their " plants! A good number of families bought a nature trail sheet and had fun.
Much cider was also drunk ;-)Well the event in the hall was the tasting of the winners (and all entrants) for the Big Apple Cider and Perry awards.
Compostman and Compostgirl came over later, Compostgirl spent most of the time playing with her friends, although she did walk the trail and pronounced it "fun"
Compostman took a turn on the plant stall while I went and got much needed tea and cake from the Tarrington Brownies.
Plant stall after an hour, not much left!
We sold everything in the 3 hours we were there, apart from a few big trees...which have now also found a home.
And we raised nearly £100 for Eco Club, which I think is a good total :-)
Lovely trees waiting to be bought!
Mmmm salads, tomatos, beans, peas, aubergines, peppers, herbs...all waiting to go to new homes.
I did 3 trips to the village hall and then set up my table, along with a trestle table kindly provided for me, outside the hall and laid out the stall.
Sue joined me at 1.30 and we made ready for the flood of people coming for the start of the cider tasting in the hall. We had the plants to sell and had designed and written a Family Nature trail as well to sell. This was a sheet with a map of a walk across the fields from the village hall to Aylton Church and the wonderful, newly refurbished Court Barn, with 20 things to spot along the way. We had all had fun the previous Sunday doing this walk and getting the clues sorted out!
Business was very brisk on the plant stall, we sold lots of plants and I was very busy giving advice on how to grow the various veg plants to people who hadn't grown much stuff before but wanted to start growing, which I found very encouraging! We had grown a lot of heritage varieties and these went very quickly, especially the tomato plants and salads.
We also had a lot of general interest shown about Eco Club and Gardening Club, and of course lots of children from the school live locally so came up to look at "their " plants! A good number of families bought a nature trail sheet and had fun.
Much cider was also drunk ;-)Well the event in the hall was the tasting of the winners (and all entrants) for the Big Apple Cider and Perry awards.
Compostman and Compostgirl came over later, Compostgirl spent most of the time playing with her friends, although she did walk the trail and pronounced it "fun"
Compostman took a turn on the plant stall while I went and got much needed tea and cake from the Tarrington Brownies.
Plant stall after an hour, not much left!
We sold everything in the 3 hours we were there, apart from a few big trees...which have now also found a home.
And we raised nearly £100 for Eco Club, which I think is a good total :-)
Thursday, 23 April 2009
Gardening at School
This post really needs to be read in tandem with my posts about the Eco Club I run at school! I also teach organic gardening at the same school in the summer and autumn terms :-)
My lovely daughter Compostgirl started primary school in Sept 2005, just as her School joined both the Eco-School movement
AND the HDRA Organic Gardens for Schools Scheme. The school is small and rural with around 160 children attending. It has a sports playing field, a small wooded area and an area of grassy playground. Some of this was used to make a vegetable garden in the late autumn of 2005, giving all six classes a raised bed each of roughly 2.5 m x 1.3 m.
In Spring 2006 there was a plea for parents to help the children with their new raised beds and compost bins. I am an experienced organic gardener and so I offered to help. I started going into school and help with Compostgirl's class. At the same time I had just trained to become a Master Composter, so I got the school some more compost bins and arranged for every classroom and the staff room to have a caddy to collect compostable materials such as fruit peelings and scrap paper. All the paper towels and waste from the garden was obviously composted also!
I got more involved and all this rapidly developed into my helping three classes with their raised beds and advising the 3 other classes, along with bug hunts in the compost bins! During the Summer and Autumn term 2006 I visited the school once or twice a week, running sessions with the children, visiting the compost bins, planting up the raised beds and growing herbs and vegetables. The children ate some salad in school and all took home a bag of their produce at the end of the summer term.
We even managed to produce some boxes of autumn vegetables from the garden that the children had grown ( even though we hadn't planned this!) and these were auctioned at the Harvest Festival to raise money for Food Aid 2006.
Back to school in September 2006, and I also got involved in the co-running of a new twice monthly after school Eco Club. I have written about Eco Club in a previous post and about a third of the school are Eco Club members and it is very successful!
Summer Term 2007 saw me regularly gardening and composting with the whole school, infant classes weekly and junior classes every other week. Despite the dreadful weather we had a good harvest. Every class bed had both July harvested crops for the children to take home AND October harvested crops to go in to the Harvest Festival. In October 2007 EVERY class provided at least one veg box to be auctioned and the children were SO proud of their efforts!
In 2008 I went into school from noon on Wednesdays - we called it “Welly Wednesday!”-to teach Organic gardening to all the school. I again helped the children to plant and grow and weed and compost and harvest.
In July ALL the school took home some veg they had grown. Every class again entered a veg box of produce grown by then into the 2008 Harvest Festival auction. The children were *so* proud of what they had grown :-)
I have just today started the 2009 growing season. I recently went on a Food for Life CPD training day at Garden Organic so I can spread the word about growing, cooking and eating organic veg to other schools in my area. This is a really good scheme, if you can, get your school signed up!
I have also just started up a Gardening club at lunchtime for the Juniors and today had around 25 children attending the first sessions :-) split either side of their lunch, we planted Broad Beans and Parsnips and discussed crop rotations and how to grow potatoes, salads, carrots and leeks. Before Easter we planted some potatoes in bags as part of the Potato Council scheme, we received 2 of each variety of Emerald and Rocket and the children decided to plant one of each in our home made compost and the other in bought in peat free growing medium...the children think the ones in our own compost will do best!
As a Master Composter and Organic gardener , I want every child to understand what can and can’t be composted, how to do it, why we do it and what to do with the finished compost. I want them to go home and spread the composting message as well!
The children also learn a practical skill from me - how to grow organic veg! Many eat produce IF they have grown it, which they would not necessarily try at home if it were purchased! (How many 5-year-old children will eat Rocket, Shallots, Mizuma or Rainbow Chard?) Above all the children enjoy what we do! We have fun in the garden learning how to do stuff.
I freely admit I don't just do this out of altruism. I am selfish, really, as I get the most enormous amount of enjoyment from doing all this! I LOVE seeing the delight on the children’s faces when we harvest a crop THEY have grown! They run up to me in the street in Ledbury to tell me about their veg plots at home. Also I have worked out, if I carry on doing what I do, by the time my daughter leaves primary school I will have shown over 300 children ways of organic growing and composting. I feel that would make a pretty good epitaph on my gravestone ;-)
I have also subsequently developed a whole new career as an Environmental Educator and now Forest School Leader, purely from starting to help at my local school and becoming a Master Composter. It has all been hard work and it takes a lot of planning BUT is very oh so rewarding. I have also been lucky that the school is so receptive to what I have volunteered to do.
What we are all doing at school though, is part of a bigger message, spreading throughout the school, of living in a more sustainable way. This has benefited the children and the school in many ways and has meant the school is now working for the highest level an Eco School can achieve, the Green Flag award.
But MOST importantly, the children LOVE all what we do! And so do I...and so does Compostman, who helps out as much as he can. And so does Compostgirl, who gets her classmates to join in..!
My lovely daughter Compostgirl started primary school in Sept 2005, just as her School joined both the Eco-School movement
AND the HDRA Organic Gardens for Schools Scheme. The school is small and rural with around 160 children attending. It has a sports playing field, a small wooded area and an area of grassy playground. Some of this was used to make a vegetable garden in the late autumn of 2005, giving all six classes a raised bed each of roughly 2.5 m x 1.3 m.
In Spring 2006 there was a plea for parents to help the children with their new raised beds and compost bins. I am an experienced organic gardener and so I offered to help. I started going into school and help with Compostgirl's class. At the same time I had just trained to become a Master Composter, so I got the school some more compost bins and arranged for every classroom and the staff room to have a caddy to collect compostable materials such as fruit peelings and scrap paper. All the paper towels and waste from the garden was obviously composted also!
I got more involved and all this rapidly developed into my helping three classes with their raised beds and advising the 3 other classes, along with bug hunts in the compost bins! During the Summer and Autumn term 2006 I visited the school once or twice a week, running sessions with the children, visiting the compost bins, planting up the raised beds and growing herbs and vegetables. The children ate some salad in school and all took home a bag of their produce at the end of the summer term.
We even managed to produce some boxes of autumn vegetables from the garden that the children had grown ( even though we hadn't planned this!) and these were auctioned at the Harvest Festival to raise money for Food Aid 2006.
Back to school in September 2006, and I also got involved in the co-running of a new twice monthly after school Eco Club. I have written about Eco Club in a previous post and about a third of the school are Eco Club members and it is very successful!
Summer Term 2007 saw me regularly gardening and composting with the whole school, infant classes weekly and junior classes every other week. Despite the dreadful weather we had a good harvest. Every class bed had both July harvested crops for the children to take home AND October harvested crops to go in to the Harvest Festival. In October 2007 EVERY class provided at least one veg box to be auctioned and the children were SO proud of their efforts!
In 2008 I went into school from noon on Wednesdays - we called it “Welly Wednesday!”-to teach Organic gardening to all the school. I again helped the children to plant and grow and weed and compost and harvest.
In July ALL the school took home some veg they had grown. Every class again entered a veg box of produce grown by then into the 2008 Harvest Festival auction. The children were *so* proud of what they had grown :-)
I have just today started the 2009 growing season. I recently went on a Food for Life CPD training day at Garden Organic so I can spread the word about growing, cooking and eating organic veg to other schools in my area. This is a really good scheme, if you can, get your school signed up!
I have also just started up a Gardening club at lunchtime for the Juniors and today had around 25 children attending the first sessions :-) split either side of their lunch, we planted Broad Beans and Parsnips and discussed crop rotations and how to grow potatoes, salads, carrots and leeks. Before Easter we planted some potatoes in bags as part of the Potato Council scheme, we received 2 of each variety of Emerald and Rocket and the children decided to plant one of each in our home made compost and the other in bought in peat free growing medium...the children think the ones in our own compost will do best!
As a Master Composter and Organic gardener , I want every child to understand what can and can’t be composted, how to do it, why we do it and what to do with the finished compost. I want them to go home and spread the composting message as well!
The children also learn a practical skill from me - how to grow organic veg! Many eat produce IF they have grown it, which they would not necessarily try at home if it were purchased! (How many 5-year-old children will eat Rocket, Shallots, Mizuma or Rainbow Chard?) Above all the children enjoy what we do! We have fun in the garden learning how to do stuff.
I freely admit I don't just do this out of altruism. I am selfish, really, as I get the most enormous amount of enjoyment from doing all this! I LOVE seeing the delight on the children’s faces when we harvest a crop THEY have grown! They run up to me in the street in Ledbury to tell me about their veg plots at home. Also I have worked out, if I carry on doing what I do, by the time my daughter leaves primary school I will have shown over 300 children ways of organic growing and composting. I feel that would make a pretty good epitaph on my gravestone ;-)
I have also subsequently developed a whole new career as an Environmental Educator and now Forest School Leader, purely from starting to help at my local school and becoming a Master Composter. It has all been hard work and it takes a lot of planning BUT is very oh so rewarding. I have also been lucky that the school is so receptive to what I have volunteered to do.
What we are all doing at school though, is part of a bigger message, spreading throughout the school, of living in a more sustainable way. This has benefited the children and the school in many ways and has meant the school is now working for the highest level an Eco School can achieve, the Green Flag award.
But MOST importantly, the children LOVE all what we do! And so do I...and so does Compostman, who helps out as much as he can. And so does Compostgirl, who gets her classmates to join in..!
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