Staff and students at St. David Catholic Elementary School continue to embrace the outdoor classroom concept. Last June, the primary and junior grade teachers and their students planted tomatoes, cucumbers, purple beans, squash, lettuce & nasturtium flowers in large planters around the school yard. During the warm summer months, the Better Beginnings Better Futures summer program took care of the garden boxes by weeding and watering the vegetables. This September, St. David School students were able to harvest tomatoes, cucumbers and nasturtiums from the garden boxes.
“The students were so excited to be able to make and eat a salad that they had grown themselves. The school purchased the lettuce to add to the student’s salad. We were also able to harvest broccoli, carrots, cucumbers and tomatoes from the community garden at Victory Park. We worked in partnership with the community to help plant the Victory Park garden in the Donovan. Our students could not get enough of the vegetables that they had grown themselves. I am very proud of their initiative and their excitement and positive energy was contagious”, stated Terri Lynn Lepage, St. David School grade 3 teacher.
In other exciting ‘green’ news at St. David School, the grade 1 & 3 classes were able to harvest the worm casings from their vermicomposters and will be using that to fertilize the school garden boxes this fall! The school continues to compost as an entire school community including the Best Start Aboriginal HUB and Better Beginnings Better Futures After School Program. The school continues to work in partnership to reduce, reuse and recycle.
