Kids reap what they sow in gardens growing at Stanislaus County schools
By Kerry McCray
kmccray@modbee.com
Lanae Grier, 10, is a whirlwind in the school garden.
She hands out shovels, plants zinnias, picks vegetables and pulls weeds. And she does it all after school, when other kids her age are apt to be at home in front of the computer or TV.
Lanae, a fifth-grader at Modesto's Eisenhut Elementary, doesn't mind pitching in to tend to the leafy cluster of raised beds made of recycled plastic that sit on the blacktop next to the school's parking lot. It's where she tried a radish for the first time.
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At Eisenhut, children fill out employment applications to be part of the garden crew. They grow everything from bok choy to heirloom tomatoes. At Empire Elementary, students are planting salad greens in wheelbarrows.
At Walter White elementary in Ceres, kids planted mushrooms, which worked into a lesson on macro- and microorganisms.
"There's not a single subject I can't teach in that space," fourth-grade teacher Jill-Marie Purdy said of the school's garden.
Math? Kids calculate the square footage of their garden. Language arts? Students write stories and poems about their garden. History? Children study California in the context of our state's rich agricultural heritage.
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http://www.modbee.com/2010/04/18/1132016/kids-reap-what-they-sow-in-gardens.html#ixzz0lUWTIOyg