Fourth Grade in the Forest

 

 

Fourth grade classes were the first to put the new trail through the woods to good use as part of their unit on Virginia ecosystems. Each group got up close and personal with their small piece of the forest floor, sketching and labelling living and nonliving things they found in their plots. They plan to come back and do soil tests with the plots later in the year. The trail has been a work in progress since last year, and it's almost finished! We have an outdoor classroom, signs marking plants and trees native to Virginia, and a nice long cleared path all the way through the woods. One loop still needs some clearing, and we have a local boy scout working on bridges and mulching for the trail as part of his Eagle Scout project.  Many, many thanks to the PTA Eco Committee, volunteers from the Kohls department store across from Fairview,  parent, ecologist and cub scout leader Mary Benger, and boy scouts from troop 1346 and their families for helping create this awesome learning opportunity right in our backyard!




Fourth graders observing and recording.





The woods next to school, before!

Mulch by the truckload.

Fourth grade studying Virginia ecosystems.

We found all KINDS of interesting things clearing the trail.



It's ready, come on outside!

A year in the Learning Gardens

Courtesy of NurtureStore

Here's a tentative idea of what we'd like to focus on each month in Fairview's Learning Garden.

September:  weed, transplant perennials

October:  create plant labels, mulch and plant cold season veggies & bulbs (Journey North Tulip Test Garden) 

November:  gather seeds & uses, bird scavenger hunts

December: Sunflower shaped sundial using chalk and pots (see above photo.)

January: ice sun catchers, science of melting

February: Using paper rolls create seedling plantings, participate in the Great Backyard Bird Count

March: spring cool veggie planting

April: make nature prints with air dry clay for Mother's Day magnets

May: worm surveys using clear sided root boxes

June: harvest party and flower/leaf pressing

October in the Learning Gardens

This month in the Garden

In October, we realize the need to create functional plant markers as we have transplanted some existing plants and look to label seeds of cool season crops.

Using paint stirrers, classes can choose one of our plants to write on the stick first in pencil, then with paint trace the letters and decorate the stick. Some classes may want to choose a theme for their labels (a rainbow, various shades of blue and yellow, stripes or swirls, are some ideas.)

Younger students can trace pre-written labels, older students can help look up the names of plants they select to label in the perennial beds by looking at plant characteristics and using a field guide.

Secondly, we need to get seeds in our four veggie beds before too much time passes!  So in the first two weeks of October, we will plant radish, turnip, spinach, kale and chard seeds.

For younger classes, drinking straws will be pre-inserted in our rows enabling them to take their seed to the appropriate row (labeled with our fancy new labels!) and place the seed down the straw. Then, they can remove the straw and pat the dirt down with their finger.

Older students will be able to help string a planting line, dig the trench and plant the seeds by hand.

A signup sheet has been posted by the mailboxes in the front office. We need teachers who are willing to bring their kids outside for a thirty minute window or so this month to sign up soon so we can get on their schedule.

The Learning Garden committee and staff liaisons are super excited to get Fairview students engaged and enjoying the garden space. We have plans to offer monthly “programs” and would like each class to choose at least one to participate with. By encouraging students to help build, create and care for the gardens it develops a sense of ownership and responsibility.

Parents and grandparents are sought as willing volunteers to help in the garden or with some of these hands-on projects as garden guides for students.  For a full calendar of our monthly garden projects, check this blog.

Since Labor Day, volunteers have been working on getting weeds gone and plants flourishing! We’ve had several donations including hostas, bee balm, daylilies, crocosmia, and phlox. Fairview families have also been gracious in giving cast off pots, large and small, which will be used for hands-on planting with students and bringing some green to our patio and classroom door areas.  All the donations and help are certainly appreciated!

We also are planning to develop and install two hardscape hands-on play features for the gardens, one in the fall and one in the spring. Some ideas include a marble run, melody pole, root box and weaving wall. Stay tuned for more details on that.

Green Team Conducts School Waste Audit

One of the steps to becoming a certified Eco-School along the Consumption and Waste Pathway is to do an audit of your school’s waste to see if there are things being thrown away that could be recycled, reused, composted, or in some other way saved from the landfill.  The student members of the Green Team bravely donned their plastic gloves and sorted through two bags of trash from the hallways of Fairview.  We were a bit surprised at what we found…although we are in our third year of a school-wide recycling program, and many of the kids are doing a great job recycling every day in their classrooms and in the cafeteria, it looks like we still have a lot of room for improvement.

"Why is this perfectly good pencil in the trash?"

Only a little over half of our "trash" is actually trash!

 The results after the green team students sorted two bags of “trash” into white paper, colored paper, cardboard, plastic, metal and actual trash, which included food waste.

Blooms and Butterflies in the Learning Gardens

Originally published June 17, 2014

Easter Tiger Swallowtail on a swamp milkweed.

The pollinator garden is blooming, and the bees and butterflies have taken notice. If you have a chance to peek in the Learning Gardens in the next few weeks, you may see a visitor like this gorgeous Eastern Tiger Swallowtail.  This one is enjoying the nectar from a variety of milkweed plant. The butterfly weed is also showing off bright yellow flowers, and the common milkweed should follow soon with big round clusters of purple-ish flowers.  Did you know milkweed is the only host plant for Monarch butterfly caterpillars? We plan to plant more milkweed and other nectar plants to become a certified Monarch way station. To read more about Monarchs, their incredible migrations, and why they are declining, click here. 

Common milkweed.

Butterfly weed.

Winter Bird Garden Underway

Originally posted June3, 2014

Fairview received a Schoolyard Stewardship Mini-Grant from FCPS to turn the courtyard between the library and the reading center into a ‘Winter Bird Garden’.  There was already a flowering dogwood in the courtyard, which has been known to be visited on more than one occasion by bluebirds. Students planted bushes native to Northern Virginia including Winterberry Holly and Red and Black Chokeberry. These bushes have berries that persist into winter and provide an important food source for local birds. We still have to plant Little Bluestem and Broomsedge, tall native grasses that will provide seeds and cover, plus a couple native honeysuckle vines that might attract a few pollinators. The kids were asking great questions about why we were planting what we were planting, and I heard more than one “gardening is fun!”.  

Thank you to FCPS for awarding Fairview this grant, and thank you to Lisa Bright at Earth Sangha native plant nursery for her advice on plant selection.

Welcome to Fairview Footprint

Originally published May 28, 2014

Fairview is going green! We are following the National Wildlife Federation Eco-Schools program, working to achieve our Bronze Award this year. We are focusing on two pathways, the Consumption and Waste Pathway, and the School Grounds Pathway. Check back often for pictures and updates on our progress.

http://www.nwf.org/Eco-Schools-USA.aspx