Activating schoolyards through garden enrichment
Guest post by: Bekah Marten, WSU Clark County Extension School Garden Coordinator
In my current role as a School Garden Coordinator in southwest Washington state, I have been able to work alongside school staff to help develop garden programming at area elementary schools. Often the schools that I have partnered with are excited about establishing a school garden, but they struggle with how to incorporate the garden spaces into the daily rhythm of their classes or do not feel confident in knowing how to plan, plant and manage a garden. Creating garden enrichment programs in these schools has been a successful way to activate their outdoor learning spaces as well as overcome some of the barriers staff expressed.
Garden enrichment programs can be incorporated into the school day without taking time from classroom learning. They can be led by staff or by parent or community volunteers. These types of programs allow students to explore their schoolyard in a different way. Lastly, garden enrichment affords students an opportunity to share something about themselves as well as gain natural world experiences in a non-academic setting.
One example of this would be to host an open garden time during a school’s lunch recess. A recess garden program can scale based on your number of adult staff or volunteers and what your goals are for the program. It can meet once a week, every other week, or monthly. This is a low-cost program that can be run regardless of whether your school has a set garden space or growing area and would be open to all students in the school.
When designing a recess garden time, choose a theme for that week’s session. In the fall you may want to explore leaves, spiders, or squash. In the spring months, insects, birds, vegetables, flowers or weather are all great options. Once your theme is picked, choose activities or stations that will be accessible to both the youngest primary grades as well as hold the attention of older grade school kids. For example, providing found natural objects (leaves, twigs, cones, small stones, etc) and allowing kids to make temporary art with them is an accessible project for the youngest students while still allowing for older children to create more intricate art pieces.
I have found that setting up three stations helps to manage the flow of students through the garden area. In choosing station activities, I like to have one that is a hands on and exploratory, a creative station, and a “Did you know” type station where student’s can learn something about the given weekly theme. This allows for all learning styles and interest levels to be accommodated. The “Did you know” stations are a great opportunity for students who have prior gardening experiences or knowledge about the natural world to share those stories or information with the station adult and their peers. Staff have noticed that students who are often more reserved in class open up when they can share their personal stories or things they know in the garden.
Enrichment programs like this are a great experience for all involved. Many of the schools where I work have a student population that does not have immediate access to an outdoor space to explore. Their schoolyard and the loose structure of a recess garden program allows for that freedom of exploration, creativity and learning in an outdoor setting. This fall, one student shared his excitement with me about learning how to prepare a garden bed for winter. When I asked what was most exciting about it, he said that his grandmother really wanted to learn how to garden, and now he will be able to teach her. Even many of the parent volunteers share that they walk away having learned or discovered something new about the natural world around them.