We've Got Worms!

Our after school club is growing by leaps and bounds.  To kick off our club, we had a visit from Mrs. Brennan from the NC State Extension office of Forsyth County and Dr. Elizabeth Gamble from the Downtown Health Plaza where we mixed a soil starter mix and learned about the appearance and function of seeds.  

In our next meeting we watched a video on vermiculture from the NC State Extension office and got a few things planted in our peat pots. 

For our third session, we set up our vermiculture (worm) composting bin and planted more cool weather crops in hopes of getting the seedligs ready for sale and donation.   Check out all of the pictures to see our kids in action!

Thank you to Myer's Nursery, Home Depot, Lowes and

Frank's Perennial Border Inc., who have all donated 

materials for the greenhouse! 

Buddy Classes

Buddy Classes in Bloom!

Mrs. Lobree's and Mrs. Hall's classes have been "buddied" together and have planted a few bulbs in the greenhouse.   As you can see in the pictures below, a few of them are beginning to grow.   We are hoping to see more growth in the coming weeks, and send them home for families to enjoy.

Thank you!

 First and foremost, we owe a huge Thank You to Mr. Joe Tappe and Mr. David Olson for building our tables.  Without you, our greenhouse would not be as successful as it is!

Thank you also to our generous donors who have given funds to purchase wood for the tables, soil, seeds, worms and more! 

Thank you for giving our students this learning opportunity!  

 Here we grow again!

We decided to grow some potatoes, carrots and lettuce for our green house. Our plants, like our radishes and paper whites have continued growing and have survived throughout the cold night last night. We decided to give our paper whites as gifts to our parents and sell what we have left for more plants and materials for the green house. The paper whites will be $5.00 a piece and will be wrapped in craft paper to make it look nice for the holidays.  Check back soon for a picture of a sample!

Our groups have continued researching grants for the plants, and the bugs and insects that we will be putting in our green house if we get the chance to. We also have researched what plants we may grow in the spring. Our plants have survived for so long and we still  have hope that they will fully grow. Please send us more soil and other materials to keep the green house alive! - By Chase and Stephen

Next Steps

During Thanksgiving break our plants have grown so much more. Our onion's, radishes and green onion's have sprouted a lot more. We've enjoyed are planting and now we are researching what plants to grow next, how to improve on our plants we already are growing, the cost of the them (If we sell them) and the bugs/insect's we could put in our environment. We hope our plants will soon be full grown.

We need more soil! Please send in soil with your student A.S.A.P. - By Chase

The First Sprouts

Our plants have grown so much in 3 days that they have filled up the soil with roots and have sprouted.  We have had a ton of fun planting these paper whites, onions and radishes.  We think that the plants will grow to be full size in less than a month hopefully.  Photography and introduction by Chase and Stephen 

On Tuesday, in addition to checking on the plants, watering them, and beginning our research, we had a visitor from the school district.  Mr. Kim Underwood visited to take pictures of the students gardening, and  may feature us on the district website www.wsfcs.k12.nc.us,  or on the school system's blog http://wsfcschools.blogspot.com/.

After checking on the plants we headed to the computer lab to conduct research on our topics of choice:
Grants
Drip Irrigation
Vermiculture
Herbs and other plants we can start

  

Seeds of Progress

We continue to see progress in the greenhouse.  We are VERY appreciative of the donations, time and energy that parents have contributed.   We now have a gorgeous table in our greenhouse and will have another soon.  We have also planted some cool season crops.  We have cabbage, onions and radishes planted. The students also have planted paper whites to sell or bring home in a few weeks. 

We have talked about seeding (with the necessary amount of room between), read labels, discussed planting / watering techniques, we have repotted a plant that was becoming too large for its pot and discussed the parts of the plant and seed. 

This week students also grouped themselves according to what interested them.  We are going to research how to grow herbs, how to create a drip irrigation system (because we will need to have the plants watered on weekends / breaks), some students signed up to maintain the blog, others are going to apply for a Wal-Mart grant and the last group is going to start our vermiculture bins this week. 

Here are some pictures from our Discovery Classes this past Tuesday and Thursday.  

Things we continue to need:  

• 2-3 outdoor trashcans (preferrably new, or just clean would work)
• soil 
• red wrigglers 
• drip irrigation supplies
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