Home & Garden: Budding young gardeners

At Clearview Meadows Elementary School in Stayner, there is a crop of young gardeners who voluntarily spend some of their recesses with the school’s garden club.

Building on the legacy of kindergarten teacher Claudia Chandler, the club formed this year, in collaboration with Grade 4 teacher Lisa Courtney and parent volunteer Irina Proper, to expand the school’s focus on fostering future gardeners.

All three are passionate gardeners and they hope that the students will build on their skills when they transition to high school next door at Stayner Collegiate Institute (SCI) by enrolling in the green industries program.

“The goal is to foster a love of the outdoors, getting outside and being together,” said Courtney.

The garden club has 10-15 dedicated members who are learning how to start seeds inside, and which ones can be sown directly into the raised beds at the front of the school. During recess, they water and weed the beds and can already see peas, spinach, and radishes popping up through the soil. Marigolds have been planted for pest control and there was some debate this week if the carrots had sprouted or not. The garlic that was planted in the fall is more than a foot tall.

For many years, Chandler has been planting garlic and potatoes with her kindergarteners, along with a three sisters garden of corn, beans and squash, using an Indigenous companion planting method. In the fall, the class will make a soup eaten with bannock and garlic butter, using the ingredients from the garden.

Chandler said the goal is to instil a respect for the land and learn how to be self sufficient.

There is a focus on food production with the bounty supporting Chandler’s after school cooking club.

Some of the students say they have family gardens at home but others don’t. Thanks to a grant from the Simcoe County District School Board, Clearview Meadows is currently working with SCI to build more garden boxes so they can expand their beds, and cold frames to extend the growing season.

Proper and Courtney say their team has a lot of ideas and they are always finding ways to expand the program, hopefully further integrating it into the curriculum.