Project Profile

Summary

An unused patch of our yard has been converted into a productive kitchen garden to supply fresh, seasonal produce to our day care centre and kinder. We will utilise our used paper and food scraps for compost and worm food to fertilise our garden so we don’t need chemicals, and recycle suitable grey water to water the plants. This garden will be a first step towards reducing the environmental impact of the school’s activities, and provide an educational tool to integrate education for sustainability outcomes into our classroom.

The addition of our garden to our yard inspired a number of other garden projects and inspired a lot of: conversation; artworks; and activities based on the themes of gardens and our environment. Our initial Working Bee was incredibly productive and parents and staff were inspired to add more plants to our yard and use a variety of recycled materials such as garden beds eg old shoes, wheelbarrows, tyres, washing baskets and bricks. Staff and parents planted succulents and native shrubs. Then on plating day the children were able to plant all the herbs and veggies themselves.

The children have learnt what worms do and don’t eat and help feed the worms and compost. The children have had great discussions and created art works and photos and stories about recycling, looking after our marine life, healthy eating and using grey water or “recycling water”. These discussions and this learning has been sparked by resources purchased with our grant money and the garden itself. Environmental concerns have been a very hot topic since the creation of our garden. The children were able to eat and pick the veggies. This was fantastic educationally and saved on our whole centres carbon footprint of getting produced freighted into the supermarket.

Jim Mead from Land Learn came to show us how to plant seedlings and care for our: plants; compost; and worms. Bunnings Warehouse donated a worm farm and worms, tools and compost bin to the project. Many parents, staff and children donated their time and plants to our garden. Local council donated very rich soil that we believe contributed to the success of our veggies.

Photography

Dunstan Reserve Kindergarten