Building Garden Bean Tipis...Brick by Brick, Branch by Branch

Today was one of those days I felt like the luckiest teacher in the world. I said to a colleague of mine, "I feel like I have this secret. I almost feel bad about it. I get to come to work and do this. I have too much fun on days like this!"


He looked at me with a smile and replied, "When you do something you love, you never work a day".


Of course, we've all heard it before, and if you are a teacher, I TRULY hope you have felt it before! Being outdoors, surrounded by nature, and working on a project (or many projects) that your students are completely engaged in. There is a certain buzz that fills the air. There's a little laughter, lots of problem solving going on, and many scurrying feet moving around eager to help out and offer support. For about an hour and a half today, this was how the 5th graders worked alongside some amazing Kindergartners, as both groups worked in their school garden.


Some of the 5th graders and Kindergartners are working to build bean tipis. This is part of the 5th graders' project study, "How Can we Turn Trash to Treasure?" They are acting sort of like mentors for the Kindergartners, and they teamed up in such a organic way this afternoon. Ms. Burlin and I have planned things together before, but today was quite a coincidence. Two teams worked side by side and helped each other build. The Kindergartners used some long twigs that had been donated to their class, and the 5th graders used some bamboo. Both groups built circular 4 inch wide raised beds around their tipis to hold bean seeds that will soon climb the twig towers.


Other students worked out in the garden too. Some worked on creating herb planters out of recycled bottles, while others painted a mural on a tarp that will hang behind the 7' tall vertical herb wall. A few sat quietly and wrote a children's book complete with illustrations called "How to Make Pasta From Scratch". These were all equally important projects that will help us develop a better understanding of how we can make better use of our resources.


It was a beautiful day, and I am so happy to be able to share these pictures with you!

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