Start with the ending

Posted on June 4, 2014 by kidsingardens

In addition to being one of my favorite David Wilcox songs, this is also how I feel about any big project. Mission statements are important because they serve as a roadmap to where you want to go. Our school garden has had one for a long time, and I return to it all the time, but just yesterday we finished a project to have it printed on a sign and hung in the garden for all to see.

And just in time for this Saturday’s 2nd Annual Julian Garden Tour! If you’re in Southern California, consider coming up for the day. Seven gardens are on display, including the school garden, from 10-4. Tickets, which are the maps to and the descriptions of the gardens, are $20 and can be bought at Town Hall on Main Street or Julian Elementary on the day of the event. All proceeds benefit the district’s Farm to School efforts.

Thank you to Leslie and Brian at Wet Duck Design for creating and installing our sign!

March Garden Tour

Posted on March 24, 2014 by kidsingardens

It’s March in the garden, and it couldn’t be prettier. Stroll with me.

Carmen from Julian Pathways led the effort to start a monthly “have lunch with your parent in the garden” event. The first attempt was an unqualified success with over 50 students and parents sharing a meal on Friday afternoon.

Photo courtesy of Scot Copeland

Photo courtesy of Scot Copeland

Our Harvest of the Month is citrus. Citrus doesn’t grow in Julian so we tasted delicious grapefruit from the “neighboring” town of Borrego.

The breast cancer awareness ribbon is in full bloom! Photo courtesy of 6th grade student Avery McFedries.

Miss Lynn recently spruced up the gazebo with a new “coffee table,” pillows and a thorough cleaning.

She also tucks these little things around the garden. I love discovering them.

Pediatric residents from UCSD do part of their community health rotation at our district, through Pathways. Garden Ambassadors, decked out in St. Patrick’s attire, give the doc a tour.

We added a geranium to the new mailbox to match the flag.

Second grade students seeded this new circular bed and wagon with California wildflowers.

After the rains, one of the garden volunteers found this on the back slope of the garden. We’re thinking bobcat?

It was the garden’s turn to make a display for the front office.

Julian kids get to plant a lot of daffodils but they rarely get to go back and pick them. I had students make “surprise” bouquets for their teachers from flowers in the garden.

I’ll close with a link that captures our teacher “flash mob” last October on National Food Day. “We can change the world”—not just a pop song! The truth! (Right, Susi?)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2ZZmOzmFqQ

You’ve got mail(box)!

Posted on March 15, 2014 by kidsingardens

One of the many purposes of our school garden is to demonstrate good gardening practices and concepts for our community. Recently we’ve built a series of 3×3 raised vegetable beds, and we’re making “how-to” flyers to put in the adjacent mailbox for parents/other visitors who might want to build some at home.

Unveiling the newly installed mailbox:

Now we need to put some colorful plants in the planter on the backside and fill it with gardening information flyers. Thanks to the artist (Ethan), the donors (Mom and Dad), and the crew that installed the whole thing (Mr. Copeland, Mr. Harvey and the 4th grade reading students!)

Almost 200 children, in the garden, every week

Posted on February 21, 2014 by kidsingardens

Parents started the elementary school garden 4.5 years ago. We started by cleaning the space up, followed by more cleaning up of the space. We built structures, renovated a gazebo, added raised beds, commissioned a table, put the compost bins in place and began fundraising and grant writing. Every year we push the project forward—adding wildlife habitat, fruit trees, a solar fountain, works of art, native plants, a rainwater harvesting system…. Three years ago we launched Garden Ambassadors..and then two years ago I began teaching a formal garden class every Wednesday afternoon during our enrichment classes. Last year we dove head first into Farm to School.

This February our garden education program took a big leap forward. Every class now goes to the garden, every week, for a 30-40 minute class which I am honored to teach. Children are in the garden all day long, doing more than we’ve ever done before–learning vocabulary, writing, singing, planting, harvesting, cooking, eating, mapping, creating, exploring. It has been thrilling. Thank you to everyone whose vision, hard work and love for “kids in gardens” has brought us to this point! Extra special thanks to Julian Pathways (our on-campus family and student support center which I will write more about soon) for making this phase of garden instruction possible!

With the ESK class, ready to sing and hunt for letter of the week in the garden

February Garden Tour

Posted on February 14, 2014 by kidsingardens

Time for a walk around the garden. Leave your jackets at home—it’s 76 degrees here today in Julian.

I picked up these banners at a garage sale in my effort to add holiday touches to the garden.

Miss Lynn added these:

Valentines Day is the rule of thumb for planting peas, and peas we did plant!

Kale is our harvest of the month, and my parent helpers/Garden Beneficials cooked up kale chips at our outdoor kitchen for the fifth graders. One thing I have become convinced of during my tenure as garden teacher—-NUTRITION EDUCATION WORKS! These kids were gobbling down the kale chips, begging for more, asking for the recipe, declaring it to be one of their favorite foods….uh, kale chips!

Harvesting from our new 3×3 beds:

Cooking in our new little convection oven at our outdoor food prep station:

Munching away:

A Farm to School project recently finished! I had sets of banners made for the crops that are grown in San Diego each season. The winter set now enhances the indoor area where children pick up their lunches.

Next to the banners is one of the photographs taken by a student in our after-school photography program Kids with Cameras, identifying the chef behind the meal.

Early start kindergarten and kindergarten students focus on a “letter of the week.” I’m using these empty picture frames to teach garden vocabulary. The students hunt for them, and we learn the name of the object framed. D-d-d-d for daffodil!

Lastly, our district recently received a Live Well San Diego proclamation from our county board of supervisor for our wellness programs. Pictured left to right–County Supervisor Diane Jacob, School Board president Eileen Tellam, Superintendent Kevin Ogden, and me. Also recognized were Teresa and Jeremy Manley who were also present at the meeting.

Food Day: An educational feast!

Posted on October 31, 2013 by kidsingardens

The following article will appear in next week’s Julian News. Great photos follow after the story!

Joining with individuals, schools and cities across America, Julian Elementary School celebrated its first National Food Day on October 24^th. From 9:00 to 2:00, K-5 students were treated to eight different workshops spread across campus focusing on food, agriculture, cooking and nutrition. Simply put, students and staff ate it up.

All sessions were experiential, interactive and expertly taught by a team of volunteers. Representing the Julian Apple Growers Association, Mary Prentice and Teak Nichols related the history of the apple while having the students press their own cider. Josh Rasmussen, from Down the Road Farm, led students in a planting activity as well as brought farm animals for the kids to enjoy. Farm Smart, a program of the UC Desert Research and Extension Center, lent us Stephanie Collins for a wonderful program that included churning butter, comparing animal feed, and milking Bessie, a wooden cow equipped with an inner stainless steel container filled with real milk. Camp Stevens staff Ryan Wannamaker and Correen Walsh captivated kids in the garden with pollinator games, honey tastings and dressing up as beekeepers. Led by Tricia Elisara and Gina VanderKam, students played vocabulary-rich “Garden Bingo” and interacted with the outstanding documentary film “Nourish” about global food issues.

Cooking was another key ingredient of the day. Chef Greg from Healthy Adventures Foundation enlisted students to help make lettuce wraps and flavorful tostadas. Across campus, Chef Jeremy Manley and Carie Quick talked with students about the new school lunch program (catered by Jeremy’s on the Campus) and had the students brainstorm new menu items. To tie it all together, Carmen Macias led a game in classifying edible plant parts, decorating a “My Plate” diagram with healthy choices and ending with a fitness activity. Many parents, Garden Beneficials and other dedicated community members generously gave their day to assisting at each workshop.

To add to this educational banquet, the campus was decorated with posters made by students in the weeks prior, promoting good food and healthy habits. At 11:00, students gathered on the playground for a scheduled exercise break led by Coach Dobby from the Julian Fitness Center. Just before starting, however, music came on the load speaker and Principal/Superintendent Kevin Ogden moved to the center of the campus, dancing. Teachers joined him from all directions, and the first ever flash mob at Julian Elementary was performed, appropriately enough to the song “We can change the world” on a day dedicated to making a healthier world for all of us!

Celebrating Food Day was an idea generated by the school’s Farm to School Team as part of the year-long USDA planting grant awarded to the district and spearheaded by Pathways Executive Director Susi Jones. To learn more about National Food Day, or to begin planning activities for next year, please visit www.foodday.org and/or contact the Farm to School Coordinator Tricia Elisara for more information.

Students made these posters in University of Wednesday

Cranking the cider press (Photo courtesy of Karen Alexander)

Wait a minute….is that Gina VanderKam playing Garden Bingo? (On a visit from Washington, she was my right hand woman all day!) She is still trying to get the crayon off her fingers….

How adorable is this?

An activity to classify the edible parts of the plant

Working on a “My Plate” activity

After this class, the girl pictured told me “Best day ever!”

Farmers are outstanding in their field, being photographed

Posted on October 11, 2013 by kidsingardens

Kids with Cameras, our afterschool photography class, is off and running again (I’ve written about it here, here, here and here if you’d like to know more.) This semester we’re focusing on food, so we took kids to “Down the Road” Farm–one of the places sourcing Jeremy’s on the Campus with fruit and vegetables. Farmer Josh, Farmer Bob and even Chef Jeremy were on hand to be photographed. The idea is that we will enlarge some of the day’s best shots and use them in the cafeteria to help students make a connection between their food and the people/farms that grow it.

The farm is set at the base of Volcan Mountain–a stunning site.

A student chats with Chef Jeremy.

The greenhouse provided nice, diffuse light on an otherwise very bright afternoon.

We found that the kids were a bit shy about approaching the farmer/chefs so one of the instructors set them up in stations, so kids went down the line, interacting with them while shooting–a bit more directed approach. Here Eva talks with Chef Jeremy by the amaranth.

Chef Jeremy by the amaranth.

Farmer Josh had a surprise: extra 2 inch models.

Photo courtesy of Anne Garcia

A van full of happy children loaded down with flowering root vegetables!

Coming soon: what the children photographed that day. I’ll leave you with something that caught my eye! Ah autumn!

Another Big (and Yummy) Idea

Posted on June 5, 2013 by kidsingardens

Although we have used our Whole Foods-funded cooking station for simple food prep, we recently used it for one of our Big Ideas—full-fledged cooking classes in the garden. Chef Greg from Healthy Adventures, through California School’s VEBA program, provided an afternoon of cooking instruction as part of our staff wellness program. He made white bean hummus, Greek salad with swiss chard and kale, and spring peas with dates and walnuts.