Garden Designs

It has been exciting to think about the products of our gardening project. Groups of students will be responsible for 16 square feet of garden space. Students chose their own groups based on class periods. I have 3 classes of students developing this project, a total of 72 students.

The first task for students was a garden design competition. Students measured out an area between our library and J-Wing, the first middle school wing. Each group layed out the perimeter on graph paper and began developing the designs. The designs needed to address three areas: functionality, aesthetics, and education.

For functionality, students needed to keep in mind some of the givens for the garden. These givens included accomodating twelve 4' X 4' garden boxes and six 4' X 8' garden boxes. In addition, they needed to layout the boxes with three feet of mulch separating the boxes. Finally, any grassy area needed to accomodate a 72-inch mower deck utilized by our Physical Plant employees who maintain campus lawns.

For aesthetics, students needed to consider what design elements would be eye-pleasing to campus visitors. What design layout would be inviting to passerbys? Where should sitting/grassy areas be located?

For education, students needed to consider how the space could be utilized to accomodate a K-12 campus community. How would the design accomodate collaboration with elementary students? Does it make sense to have a sitting area in the center or on the edges? How easy would it be to expand the garden to allow for other grade level participation if additional funding is secured?

The top six designs were chosen among the 30+ designs submitted. Each class voted on their top 2 designs. Above is a picture of each design.

Pre-Gardening Jitters...

Only four short weeks before students return for the new school year. I view these weeks with excitement, anticipation, apprehension, and anxiety. Will I be able to pull off this project with my students? Will we be able to impact the lives of our homeless population in a meaningful way? Will my students learn tolerance, have empathy, own this project? Can we pull it off?

It is the beginning of my 7th year at P.K. Yonge DRS. I will be teaching standard and honors Biology. I will be embarking on a journey with my students as we implement a Toyota Tapestry Grant that I received this year entitled "Educating Sustainability and Social Responsibility through P.K. Yonge's Community Garden and Farmers' Market." Groups of students will be assigned 16 square feet of vegetable gardening space that they will design, plant, maintain and harvest. They will be selling their goods to the PK Yonge community and the proceeds will be donated to St. Francis House, Gainesville's downtown homeless shelter. In addition, students will be interviewing homeless in Gaineville in order to increase tolerance. Students will write the stories of these homeless people through their language arts' classes and publish them electronically. To chronicle the project, groups of students will have their own wiki which they will use to create and communicate their findings as they institute scientific research into their square foot gardening plot.

It sounds amazing and I am SOOOOO excited about getting started!

• The potential impact that this project has for my students' science kinowledge and for their social awareness of a group of people who are marginalized is tremendous.
• The potential impact that this project has for aiding a not-for-profit organization in these turbulent economic times is encouraging.
• My hopefullness for working closely with my colleagues, particularly Ms. Jen Cheveallier, 9th grade language arts' teacher, and Mr. Shane Carnley, 9th grade Algebra I teacher, as I begin to implement this project, continues to excite me.
• The opportunity to have community guidance for myself and my students with the help of Dr. Rose Koenig, Agronomy lecturer from the University of Florida and successful organic farmer, and Ms. Christine Kelly Begazo, Indian River County Extension Director who continues to work with a farm that supports an orphanage in Honduras, a relationship that she established from her years with Peace Corps.
  

As my students will be required to chronicle their journey through their wikis, I too, will chronicle my journey, modeling my expectations for my students. It is my hope to make a lifelong impact on my students as they develop their ideas about sustainability, social responsibility and tolerance. It is also my hope that this blog will serve as a global connection, so that others around the world may be inspired to take action locally and improve the lives of others and themselves.