CPBA

Champlain Brooklyn Park Academy

The first time visiting Champlain Brooklyn Park Academy, I contacted one of the many Master Gardeners that volunteers at this school:  Mary Cichon. She was more than glad to give me a ride there and was a huge help with setting up.  When Mary and I first arrived at the school, the buses were just arriving to drop the students off for classes.  We gathered supplies and headed through the school to the greenhouse. CPBA is such a neat school! There is plenty of artwork adorning the hallway walls; the theme for Kindergarten right now is Sunflowers by Van Gogh, so there is plenty of flower paintings.

The first graders were so much fun to work with!  All of them were very enthusiastic and had plenty of great answers to my questions.  I started out by asking what plants need to grow:  water, sunlight, soil (nutrients), and air (oxygen).  There wasn't one class that I needed to fill in the answers for; they knew every one.  I then showed the students how they were supposed to plant them.  First fill the bottom of the trays half full with soil. Then sprinkle the seeds on top.  I gave them the amount of seeds that were needed for one tray and told them to use all of them.  Next, sprinkle enough soil on top of the seeds just so that they are covered.  The final step was watering.  With the help of Mary and the class' teacher(s), we were able to supervise 4 groups at a time.  Each of the four classes were able to plant four trays of microgreens.  They each took one tray back to the classroom to be able to observe the growing of the plants until we harvested 2 weeks later.

The following Wednesday, I returned to CPBA with Mary Meyer to harvest microgreens with the other 3 classes that Becca G. planted with 2 weeks prior.  These classes were just as behaved and fun to work with as the last ones.  I started out by asking if the students remembered what was needed for plants to grow, and there were many hands up, willing to answer.  I then talked about the different parts of the plants.  I showed them the roots, stem and the 2 different type of leaves (true leaves are the smaller, fuzzier ones,  and seed leaves are the bigger ones). Next I showed them how they were to cut the microgreens about 1 inch from the bottom of the leaves (I just showed them where), rinse them off in the tub of water, and put them on a plate.  They got to try them with Ritz crackers and by themselves. Many of the students really liked them, but many didn't.  Each class had a different amount of kids in each category.  Once everyone got to cut their microgreens, we got together and tried the different parts of the plant, talking about texture and taste.  Compared to the other parts of the microgreens, the stem had a very bland taste, the true leaves had a rough texture and a very gross taste and the seed leaves were very smooth and sweet and the students that said they like microgreens liked this part the best.  They were then able to cut and clean as many as they would like to put in a ziplock bag and take home with them.  Most of the students were really happy for this!  Even some students that didn't like the microgreens cut some to bring home and have their family try them.

Going to Champlain Brooklyn Park Academy was a really great experience, and I am really glad that I got to work with the students and teach them something new!  I give my thanks to all of the first grade teachers that Becca G. and I worked with, Mary Cichon and Mary Meyer for transportation, and Denise Schnabel for helping set everything up.