Third grade families can find news and information relevant to their grade below. If you have news you would like to share, please submit here.
Greetings Third Grade parents,
We had a great Fall season in the Cascadia School Garden. This has been our most successful year yet, thanks to enthusiastic parent volunteering and more planting space available. Parents and students put together all of the raised beds and filled them with organic compost and soil, and the Girl Scouts built our beautiful compost bin!
Our Fall session is always exciting for the students, as they get to enjoy some of the fruits of last year’s labor. Students harvested mini pumpkins planted over the summer, and they were presented as prizes at the PTA Festival in October as well as gracing the front desk. Students harvested dried peas, which were saved for seed and shared with 5th grade science class. They also harvested bean seeds from several heirloom varieties, which we will plant in the spring. Makah Ozette potatoes, harvested from grow sacks, and yellow onions from the raised beds, were used to make a delicious homemade potato onion soup, which the whole third grade enjoyed during our Autumn Harvest Feast. We also put together a salad, and students made our favorite Awesome Sauce Dressing from apple cider vinegar, olive oil, and fresh herbs.
Students also enjoyed grazing on chard, kale, lemon balm and chamomile in the garden. We are so excited to soon have a full herb garden, for snacking and for making herbal tea.
Our lessons included songs like Dirt Made My Lunch, Gusano (I am a Worm), and Inch by Inch (The Garden Song). Ask your child to teach you a song! We learned about why tree leaves change color in the fall, and how we can “eat like a tree” for good nutrition, noticing how the bright fall colors in leaves show that trees need the same vitamins we eat in our fruits and veggies. We met some real, live red wiggler worms (Eisenia Fetida), learned about how worms turn our lunch leftovers into great fertilizer for our gardens, and then we had worm races. They were a hit! Afterward, we ripped up cardboard egg cartons for bedding for our garden’s worm bin.
I saw kids with amazing work ethic, working together to spread wood chips throughout the garden using real garden tools. We partner with the animals and plants of the garden world, working together to create a healthy and abundant world.
Huge thanks and so long to our PTA garden coordinator Linda, who is retiring from her volunteer position and handing the reins to Sherry. Gratitude to every parent who has cooked, taught, brought in supplies, watered, and worked in the school garden, and to all of the amazing 3rd grade teachers. And most of all, thank you to the third grade students, who bring their curiosity and enthusiasm to learning about the natural world in the school garden.
Rowan Maya Green
Cascadia School Garden Educator
Game night is coming up this Thursday evening – join us!
http://cascadiapta.org/event/third-grade-family-game-night/?instance_id=521
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