The King Open Garden is coordinated by CitySprouts, a year-round garden program in Cambridge, MA that partners with teachers and other educators to develop and utilize outdoor classrooms in 12 public schoolyards.
The garden has had a busy season and now it is time for it to catch some rest! All of the kale, collards, and swiss chard has been harvested and the soil has been covered with blankets of leaves and hay.
Winter rye has been planted to keep the soil intact during the harsh winter weather. Garlic has also been planted to grow deep into the warm earth during the winter. It will be ready in the spring for harvesting its scapes (the flower of garlic) in the spring and its globe in the summer.
Thanks to the hard work of many King Open classes the garden has been a great success this year. Together we planted an African Garden, and an Italian Garden. We also planted potatoes and peanuts. Finally, the garden rewarded us with a bountiful harvest of tomatoes and eggplant in September, winter squash, peanuts, and potatoes in October, and kale and collards in November.
Thank you garden for all of your delicious produce. Sleep well during the winter. Goodnight!
The garden this fall is better than ever! It is full of delicious produce thanks to the great work of this summer's interns. If you get a chance please thank the following King Open students who participated in this summer's CitySprouts Internship.
Rakoyan (6th grade), Francisco (6th grade), Ester (6th grade), Tharum (6th grade), Xavier (7th grade), and Corrina (8th grade)
King's 5/6th grade teacher Emily Lyons planted an African garden with her class in the spring and are now harvesting okra, squash, collards, peanuts, millet, and watermelon. Kindergarten teacher, Kristin Bell, brought her class out to the garden for a tour and harvested tomatoes, radishes, and carrots.
September is Childhood Obesity Awareness Month, a time to talk to children about smart food choices, and what a better place to do this than the King Open Garden. Bring your kids out to the garden and show them where good food comes from while harvesting kale, collards, greens, radishes, tomatoes, and eggplants.
The longest day of the year has come and gone. The tomatoes are standing tall. The garden is full of fresh salad greens. There are three beds of potatoes, a vibrant strawberry patch, and an African Garden. This is a great start to the summer thanks to all of the classes who planted vegetables this spring!
Suzie, Kristen, and Sonia's classes planted beans, sunflowers, and peas in the garden. Suzie's class also planted milkweed for the butterflies. Ariel and Sam's classes planted potatoes, tomatoes, basil, peppers, squash, and cucumbers. KC's class planted flowers and harvested strawberries.
Emily's fifth grade class planted an African Garden including collard greens, watermelon, squash, okra, and peanuts. Together we discussed how these fruits and vegetables originated in Africa and are now some of American's favorite foods.
Students from Lynn Brown's class came down to the garden to grow seedlings for a model of a rooftop garden that they created. The setting of their garden is Casablanca and its purpose is to provide a variety of nutritious affordable food for people living in the city.
The garden is all set for the Summer Youth Program. This year the program will begin in August. Interns will take care of the garden, learn how to cook with vegetables from the garden, and examine local sustainable food systems.
Save the day! The interns will be hosting a Summer Garden Party on August 18. We will be inviting all King Open Families for an afternoon full of food and fun in the garden! Keep your eyes peeled on the ListServe!
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Welcome back after almost a year of no activity! I'm handing off the blog and the garden to our new garden coordinator, Liz Anderson. Stay tuned for new posts on internships, classrooms in the garden, and local gardening events!
Attendance: Giulia Fulci (parent), Mitch Ryerson (parent), Alice Gugelmann and Francey Slater (CitySprouts)
Agenda:
1)Update on COGDesign
2)Workday on June 12
3)Intern applications are out
4)Review of teacher surveys
5)Funding possibilities
6)Possible plant sale, other KO garden event?
Next meeting: Monday, June 14, 7pm, KO library
1. Update on COG Design process
Mitch and Alice met with Lucia from COG Design on April 15th. She was enthusiastic about the project, asked many questions about CitySprouts and the use of the KO garden space, and explained how COG works. A central part of their work is ensuring that their designs are implemented, which means they'll have a big incentive to work within our budget constraints. Turns out they did a very similar project at Mitchell School in Needham, she'll send us pictures (see next blog posts).
Next steps:
We'll meet again in about a month or so, she'll have paperwork for us for the formal application process. After that she'll match us with a designer, and we'll work with that person from then on.
In addition to compiling the teacher surveys, CitySprouts and King Open need to think about what requirements we have of the space to fulfill the program's goals, as this will be central to working with the designer.
Also, we need to clarify who the formal client will be: Tim the principal? Or CitySprouts? She suggested the principal would be needed to do the final sign-off.In addition, who will pay the application fee?
2. Workday on June 12th
A group called People Making a Difference (PMD) will be at KO in the morning to do general tidying, building, weeding, and anything else needed to make the garden look beautiful.
3. CitySprouts Summer Internship applications are out: check the library if you or your student would like one. Due back May 21st!
4. Teacher surveys are back. An intern from CitySprouts compiled them, the results are in the next blog post).
5. Funding possibilities
In thinking about the garden redesign, we need to think of funding sources. Armed with an attractive and professional plan, we could have good success with different local and national funders. Whole Foods and Harvest Coop were a couple possibilities that were raised. Information from Jesse Wenning (parent): Lowes has two application cycles/year--one closed in February, and it looks like the next is October. We have to apply for between $2,000 and 5,000. The project to improve the KO garden seems like it would fit their criteria very well.
In addition, here is a list of potential grantors:
6. Plant sale this year, or other end of semester event?
A couple of years ago, Carla Procaskey and the “Sprouts of Hope” girls group organized a very successful plant sale fundraiser. Should we think about something similar, perhaps around graduation weekend?We could have food, plants, and general garden activities to draw more people into the garden during the festivities.We can start organizing through email.
Action List:
Alice: check with Neusa (family liaison) about scheduled events during the end of the semester, see if we can fit something garden related in
Continue to work with KO teachers to work the garden into existing curriculum
CitySprouts: Fill out COG Design application, get the process started, with advice from parents and teachers
Everyone else: start looking at funding opportunities!
