June 24th - Saturday Workshop - Sip and Paint in the Garden

 Thank you to the elementary Community Field Experience TCs for creating a wonderful Saturday workshop. This was the fifth and final of our series of workshops for 2022-2023. A big thank you as well to everyone who has participated in the Saturday workshops and building community in the Garden!

Weaving Baskets, Bracelets, and Coasters

Orchard Garden Raspberry, Black Current, Mint and Lemon Balm Mocktails

Elderberry Paint and Garden Sourced Paint Brushes

Welcome back Susan!! We've missed your music!

Making Fruit Compote and Harvesting Beans

For our final blog post, Meilang and Vivian are sharing what we did for a final day

at Orchard Gardens before having a week off to plan for a workshop!

This morning we started out with harvesting various kinds of fruit including rhubarb,

raspberries, and elderflower berries to make a fruit compote.

We chopped these fruits up along with some apples and ginger

before adding the other ingredients to the pot.

It felt nice like we were camping out in the rain with the canopy tents. 

While the compote was reduced, we shared the drawings that we had made

during our visit to the UBC Botanical Garden.Everyone’s drawings were fantastic! Amanda and James were sharing

how important a drawing skill is in science as it helps record data from specimens.

We finished sharing our drawings just as the fruit compote was finished cooking. 

Everyone had some ice cream topped with the compote and it was amazing! 

In the afternoon, we got to work and harvested some peas, like snap peas. 

Not all of the peas were ready but the ones that were the longest and

biggest were ready. 

When harvesting the peas, not only the pea needs to be pulled off

but also the little “hat” that is left over from the flower. 

This is done because the plant will think the pea is still attached and

will send energy to the area but since the pea is gone, the plant is wasting its energy. 

By removing the “hat” the plant can use its energy to create more flowers and peas.

After harvesting the beans, we headed to the greenhouse to pick up our seedlings. 

That was all for our last day at the garden and we are looking forward to

our ‘Sip and Paint’ workshop in a week.

Getting to know Fresh Roots!

    Hello everyone! Today we have Gen and Cody taking over the blog, and we’re so excited to share what we’ve learned! It’s been so much fun getting to see different gardens across our community and explore different ways they can be used and learned from. Today we ventured to David Thompson Secondary to visit another school’s garden; this time being run and organized by Fresh Roots, and it was incredibly inspirational to us future educators!

    Fresh Roots is a non-profit organization committed to bringing agriculture and fresh produce to schools and the local community. They run a variety of child and youth programs and camps with their gardens that allow for plenty of hands-on outdoor learning! This garden in-particular is vast and varied, with rows and rows of different produce. Touring the garden, we saw, smelled, and tasted so many different plants. They also have areas set aside for learning and exploration, such as their sensory garden that allows students of differing abilities to engage with the garden. The dedication to getting kids and youth interested in and engaged with the outdoors and gardening is evident in every aspect of the space, and inspiring for us to see!

    We took some time to individually explore the garden beds to find a plant that we had not previously talked about on the tour. This was a fun, engaging activity as we used our phones as a tool to investigate certain plants that we may see everyday but may not know the name of. By using our cameras on a smart device or downloaded app we were able to come back to the group and share many different discoveries! This activity really showcased that technology and outdoor learning do not have to be seen as separate functions but rather can successfully compliment one another. 

    We also spent some time helping out, with some of us taking on weeding between the garden beds while others harvested some lettuce and radishes to make a fresh salad for lunch! The storytelling and conversation came with so much ease and was vibrantly alive as we took on the garden work as a group–which left us with smiles on our faces! Seeing our food go from being in the ground to on our plates was fun and exciting, and also demonstrated to us how accessible these processes can be once a garden is established at our schools. This was a great experience and super motivating in wanting to incorporate more outdoor learning in our future classrooms. Thanks again, Fresh Roots!

 

UBC Botanical Gardens and a Workshop on Chinese Medicinal Plants

 Today Meilang and Rachel are taking over to tell y’all about our visit to the UBC Botanical Gardens. We had the chance to walk around and explore the entire garden today!

We visited the Food Garden, a part of the garden where they grow different fruits and vegetables that get donated to people in need. Seeds are also collected from the plants and donated. Near the Food Garden, is the Physic Garden, which we visited next. European Medicinal plants are grown here. There were all different types of plants there, some familiar, like chamomile and roses, but also some that are poisonous, like Stinking Hellebore which is used for skin complaints and is an ingredient in sneezing powders! It was cool to read about the history of how some of these plants came to be used, and interesting that we still use them today!

After our visit at the Physic Garden, we ventured off to try to find the Golden Spruce.  Spruce trees are normally green but there was a genetic mutation which created a spruce tree with golden needles.  The tree was important to the Haida people and to the village Gamadiis Port Clement, which was called “The Home of the Golden Spruce.”  Sadly, a man named Grant Hadwin cut the tree down which he was arrested and charged for. Some of the remains of the tree were salvaged and there are now two Golden Spruce saplings, one in the UBC Botanical Gardens and one back in Gamadiis Port Clement.  Unfortunately, despite our quest to find the Golden Spruce, we were unable to find it. After that we spent time exploring the garden and sketched plants and flowers that we found unique, or interesting. The garden is filled with an abundance of beauty and wonder and you almost cannot look in any direction without seeing something inspiring.

After our visit at the UBC Botanical Gardens, we went back to Orchard Gardens to meet the previous Orchard Gardens Project Assistant who gave a workshop on Chinese Medicinal Plants.  There are two plots on Orchard Gardens that contain these types of plants.  One of the plots has plants where the roots are harvested and used for medicine.  We learned today that the best Chinese medicinal plants are not the ones that look aesthetically the best but are the ones that have undergone some type of environmental stress. This stress creates a better medicinal compound. We had the chance to try some dried licorice root. This has many medicinal properties and can also be used to help a person stop smoking as chewing on the root alleviates some of the need to smoke.  

Computational Thinking and a Lettuce Sale

Anna and Cody coming to you today with a blog post about our workshop in the Orchard Gardens! We were very fortunate to have Erica Huang join us in learning ‘computational thinking’ in the garden. At the beginning of this session we brainstormed some ideas, characteristics, and adjectives that came to mind when addressing computational thinking. The ideas of logical thinking, patterns, algorithms were shared amongst the group as a starting point. Erica then shared that we were on the right path and showcased a list of factors to consider when incorporating computational thinking within activities, curriculum and lessons (as you can see shown in the picture below). 

We started off with an activity where we needed to gather rocks and small sticks to represent the memory, bytes and functions of the computer. With the rocks representing ‘0’ and the sticks representing ‘1’ we made a 5x5 pattern in no particular order or method. Erica then made it into a 6x6 pattern with the use of more rocks and sticks. Erica then turned around to have us switch out a rock (0) for a stick (1) or vice versa to then have her make a guess as to which item was switched. Respectfully we shall keep this technique a secret to have you one day make some guesses… should you ever encounter computational thinking in the garden… 

In groups of three, we had two people acting as computer programmers and one person acting as a robot. The robot could only move and function based off of the instructions that the programmers had given for the robot. Our task was to lead our robots to an ‘item’ or ‘treasure’ of some sort based on the path we instructed them to do so (# of steps forward, turns, moving of body levels etc). This exercise brought forward great connections to the core competencies through its collaboration, communicating and social aspects. This was a task that we all felt could be possible in almost every grade level, ultimately giving students a playful activity to build their skills upon.

Vivian the robot going for her banana peel treasure. 

In the afternoon, we harvested some lettuce and garlic scapes and brought them out to the square beside the Nest to sell. This sale was “pay what you can,” meaning that the suggested price was 3$ per head of lettuce/bundle of garlic scapes, but you could also purchase it by a donation. This was a great way to share our harvests and talk to people about the Orchard Garden. 

Nitobe Memorial Garden and Planting Thimbleberries

 Hi there, it’s Vivian and Cody bringing you the blog post today! As this is my first post, I’ll give you a little e-introduction. My name is Cody and I am a Bachelor of Education student at UBC. I have recently completed my practicum with a Grade 3 class in Vancouver. I come from a very outdoorsy family, having grown up on Vancouver Island, I really believe that connection to the land and learning from the land is very beneficial for young kids/adults to partake in. Adapting more so to the city lifestyle of Vancouver, I find you have to be more intentional with your natural surroundings. I am super excited to be a part of this community experience and explore these lands, areas, and gardens!

Today, we had the pleasure of walking through the Nitobe Memorial Garden and were very fortunate to have had the whole space to ourselves. Having learned more about Dr. Inazō Nitobe’s vision of connecting and bridging the gap between two cultures, it set the tone to lead us toward a better understanding of the path we chose to be on. It showcases that gardens can become political and demonstrate different meanings than what we normally expect from gardens. 

We all took a walk amongst the garden on our own time to take in what stood out most to us. The garden allowed us to make connections to ourselves, others and curriculum/outdoor learning as well. As a group, we brainstormed ideas for thematic lessons on topics of relationships/history, mindfulness and life cycles. Having explored these reasons we then built poems based on these themes (having incorporated every group member's words or expression). As new teachers, an idea was shared today about the bridge: one side representing curriculum as planned and the other side representing curriculum as lived; which resonates well with westernized view points and non westernized view points.

We stopped by the greenhouse and planted avalanche beets and radishes (French Breakfast). Back in the garden, we planted Thimbleberries and watered and fertilized the veggie plants (tomatoes and peas). It was a great opportunity to learn how to mix the fertilizer solution with water to feed the seedlings. The corn plot looks great after completing some weeding work. Great work, everyone! 

We are looking forward to our second week of working in the garden.

Seed Lending Library, Beeswax Food Wrap and Greenhouse Adventures

 Today we welcomed a new CFE member, Cody, to the group He will introduce himself in the next blog post. Today was his first time touring the Orchard Gardens. We were happy that he has joined the team.

(Gen, Anna and Cody)

In the morning we began by preparing materials for making our very own reusable beeswax food wraps. Many of us had seen these sold for a pretty penny. Today we had the chance to try our hands at creating them ourselves, which was more straightforward than we were expecting! We relied on the collective efforts of our peers to assure we had enough beeswax grated, and irons heated, parchment paper cut, and natural material cloth (like cotton or linen) cut and ready for use.

We took a pause in our food-wrap making to go down to the Scarfe Library. At this library (as well as the Woodward Library), there is a seed lending cabinet. This cabinet is available to the public and contains an abundance of different seeds to be borrowed. Each drawer has envelopes of various vegetable, flower, and herb seeds. Our group enjoyed selecting a few seeds that we would later bring to the greenhouse to germinate. We chose dill, marigolds, beets, lemon balm, and tomatillo. 

It is encouraged to bring back the seeds produced from the plants that grow from the borrowed seeds to maintain the library. This seed lending program is a wonderful way to make gardening available to the community. 

We made our way down to the greenhouse. We were informed that this was a site where  researchers were actively working on projects. Thus, we were unable to take pictures of the greenhouse itself. In place of, we were able to photograph the adorable residents of the greenhouse- two of the cutest cats! After giving Charlie and Lola plenty of attention, we planted and watered our seeds before setting them up in the first zone of the greenhouse. The first zone is intended to be the most environmentally protective of the plants and seeds, as they are in a fragile condition. Gradually, our seeds will move through the other zones as they become stronger and more resilient.

Rain Garden Tour at Norma Rose Point Elementary School

 Hi everyone! Today we have Gen and Vivian taking over the blog, and since this is Vivian’s first post, we thought we’d give her a chance to introduce herself! Hi, I’m Vivian. I just finished my practicum with a kindergarten class in Richmond. During my practicum, I observed that incorporating outdoor learning into cross-curricular subjects can benefit diverse learners academically and can also lead them to better well-being. My kindergarteners planted beans and they really enjoyed observing the growth of their plants. This hands-on activity allowed them to understand the content deeper and to become proactive learners who are more engaged in what they were learning about. As I spend more time in the garden, I am becoming more excited about learning gardening and outdoor learning which I can implement into my future teaching practice.

Today we took a field trip away from the orchard garden so that we could see a school’s garden in action. Norma Rose Point Elementary at UBC has a beautiful outdoor space that we were grateful to share for the day. We began our day helping lead a couple of stations for some grade 1 and 2 classes. Some of us helped explore outdoor sketching and poetry with the kids, while the rest of us helped share our learning from earlier in the week on peeling Himalayan Blackberry bark. This was a lot of fun, and the kids were great at knocking the thorns off the branches and getting into their peelings! It was great to be with kids again, and to see their connection to nature that is so well fostered at this school–it’s a wonderful inspiration for our future teaching practice!

We then explored the rain garden itself. This garden is built in a depression that helps guide rainwater from the area to it, to then help maintain a natural water filtration system in the area. This also means the garden itself requires little maintenance, as the plants are being naturally watered. These plants are also largely indigenous to BC, and are adjusted to our weather patterns, again meaning it requires little maintenance compared to your standard garden, even in the drier months. Walking through the garden felt like walking through a forest, with thick brush and little nooks and crannies to explore all over. As a child, I would feel so lucky to have this space to adventure and imagine in, and to also learn and grow from nature itself. There were a few kids we spoke to that clearly had a passion for the rain garden, and the value of spaces like these is becoming increasingly apparent to us as future educators. 

I have been learning a lot about species and features of plants for the last few days. One thing that stood out to me in the rain garden was the information about the reproduction of sword ferns. Thanks to James for the detailed explanation about how sword ferns reproduce with spores. It was really interesting to learn that sword ferns release spores which grow into tiny heart-shaped plants called gametophytes. Then the male and female reproductive structures develop on the surface of the same gametophyte plants.  I found it interesting that sperms released by the male structures swim through in the waterdrop to fertilize the egg in the female structure. It’s always fascinating to learn how plants and animals are reproduced. 

Thanks for reading, and we look forward to sharing more of our learning in the next couple of weeks!