Monica's Post

Hi all,

Going along what Alisha was doing for her first post, I'm going to do an introduction about myself as well. 

My name is Monica Chung.  I am a junior as well with a B.S. in psychology.  I haven't decided on a minor, but I am hoping to try and do a nutrition one.  I took this course because I find horticulture very interesting and I love planting stuff.  Also I wanted to study abroad and even thought a week in London may not sound like a lot of time, I think it will be a wonderful experience.  After college, I haven't really decided if I want to go to grad school yet, but it is a possibility as well as going to culinary school, for I also love cooking as well as baking.

Alisha's first blog post

Mary wanted us to put up a post this week. I wasn't sure what to post so I thought I would do a quick introduction of myself.

My name is Alisha. I am a Junior majoring in horticulture with and emphasis on plant breeding and genetics. My minor is plant biology. I decided to take this class because I have always wanted to study abroad and this worked best with my schedule and budget. I also am interested in starting and volunteering at school gardens in the future or possibly work with the education at a public garden so I felt that this class would help prepare me for my future work with school gardens.

I see that Mary posted a few pictures of the microgreens on Friday. They were starting to germinate as early as Wednesday. The pictures below are of a few trays on Thursday morning.

Microgreens Are UP!

Planted on Monday, germinated by Friday: looks like we planted the peas too shallow ???

Planting Microgreens

Watch a video with Mary Meyer, professor at the University of Minnesota teaching

How to Plant Microgreens.

Hampton Hills school near London plants Honeycrisp

Hampton Hills Junior School just west of London has a great school garden we visited in March. Here are the students planting the Honeycrisp apple tree we gave them. We look forward to seeing this tree when the class visits again next March and learning about apples in England and Minnesota. Apples are one of the 10 Plants that Changed Minnesota and a super plant for school gardens and for eating all year long.  

End of the year

Now that the semester has finally come to an end I'd like to write a recap of the last month working with Columbia Heights School District.  I was privileged to visit and teach at the school district on two different days.  On April 26th I visited North Park elementary and worked with three different classes. On May 3rd I worked with a total of five classes.  Two high school classes, one middle school class, and two elementary classes.

On the first visit I got my feet wet with teaching younger kids on how to plant seeds.  This was very enjoyable because it was fun to see the kids willing to get their hands a little dirty breaking up the soil.  This is something the older kids on the second visit did not want to do. 

On the second visit I was filmed by the Jeffers Foundation for a second grade class.  The foundation is constructing a year long video on school gardens and how they are incorporated into the classrooms as vehicles to teach the students.  To my understanding they were happy with the footage the had received and planned on continuing to shoot until the winter of 2013. 

Overall I had a very enjoyable time in the Successful School Gardens class at the U of M.  I would highly recommend this class to anyone interested in getting involed in teaching or working with younger kids.  As for now I am signing off.  Have a great summer everybody.

Sincerely,
Aaron

CBPA Fun Facts

To do a quick recap of Champlain-Brooklyn Park Academy for Math and Environmental Science, I want to list a few facts about the school.  CBPA is a public school, grades Kindergarten to 5th. There are about 760 kids total, with about 150 staff members. The first grade, which I got the wonderful privilege to teach about microgreens, has 7 classes with roughly 30 kids per class.  They have wonderful family volunteers that come in now and again to help out with anything they can.  There were a few that I was able to meet when working with the 1st grade, and they really love the way the school is run and being able to help out there!  Their garden program is run using a 20'x40' greenhouse, 11 raised garden beds (2 for each class except 5th grade who get 1), and a Greeting Garden in the front of the school.  The Hennepin County Master Gardeners play a big roll in helping out the teachers and classes by giving lessons to the students and being a big part of the gardens. Since the garden program was started at CBPA (three years at their current location), the staff have seen much more student interest in outside activity and have heard from parents about their enthusiasm to help out with the gardens at home.  Also, composting has been taken up in the school kitchen, and the entire school has become more environmentally conscious.

As for the curriculum, all 6 different grades learn something new this year; the students then have something new to look forward to in the garden every year. The Kindergarden learn about and plant perennials; the 1st graders have a Food Plate that is taught through the health class.  2nd graders grow a butterfly garden using perennials; 3rd grade learn about Prairie Restoration in their social studies class. The 4th graders learn about Plants Per Region in their social studies class, and the 5th graders have a flower garden and plant hanging baskets.  The hanging baskets are then sold at the end of the school year to pay for an end-of-the-year party, new greenhouse materials, and the rest is donated to the local food shelf.                   

The kids were so much fun to work with and were really excited to learn in the greenhouses. They all sat and listened very well while I taught them plant needs and parts and worked well together when I sent them to plant and harvest the microgreens.  CBPA has a great hold on their gardening program, thanks to the local master gardeners and the wonderful staff they have.  Most of the teachers showed a lot of interest in the greenhouse, but there were a few who were not very comfortable.  I think that, to better the gardening program at CBPA, the teachers could get a lesson(s) on how to teach about plants. I think that this would make them more willing to teach with plants, because they would feel more like they know what they are doing.

I want to give an extra thank you to our wonderful professor, Mary Meyer. We could not have taken the class without her, and I really appreciate all that she has done for us!  

Thank you, Mary, so much for everything!