We were really excited to get back to school after winter break; new projects await, and a chance to check our seeds we planted before we went on vacation.
As we expected, they sprouted over the break - students were very impressed with the results! Spinach and corn seemed to grow the most in the 'mini greenhouses' we made out of plastic bags in the windows, but nearly all of the seeds showed signs of growth. Next step is to move the seedlings into small cups to live in the windowsills for the next month or so before we plant them outside in the ground.
I also had students fill out an 'evaluation', basically a series of simple questions about our classes to give us feedback: what they like, don't like, do they look forward to the class, what other kinds of things do they want to learn, so on and so on. I was pleased to see how many of them wrote about the seed project and gardens, they really seem pumped on doing the gardens this spring.
3rd graders Marco and Kristina check out how much their seeds grew over winter break!We also started our 'ecosystems' project. Students are learning about ecosystems - what they are, different types of ecosystems, etc. They will then connect this knowledge to their own gardens they will created this spring - investigating their ecosystem, trouble shooting problems, learning about how interrelated things in nature are - as well as what they have already learned about 'communities', and the similarities between ecosystems and communities, a connection they have already picked up on.
For our first 'ecosystem art project' they are making mobiles of an ecosystem they will choose and research - we are also learning about the work of Alexander Calder and other mobile artists. They seem pretty excited about it - more updates on it as we progress!
