American Heart Association
Teaching Garden
Oak Hill has been selected as one of 7 schools in the nation to participate
in the teaching garden experience with the American Heart Association.
The goal of the initiative is to help build healthy bodies and minds
by educating students on how to grow, harvest and the value of good
eating habits.
April was a great month for the Oak Hill and American Heart Association’s
teaching garden. The month was kicked off with a planting day that included
students from kindergarten to sixth grade. Initial April plantings included:
snowpeas, lettuce, spinach, nasturtium (edible flowers), radish, broccoli,
cauliflower and cabbage. Each week, classes have gone out to check on
their beds and helped with weeding and some thinning of seedlings. It
has been a very exciting month as some of the students had the luck
of finding out who was eating our cabbage! A groundhog seems to enjoy
visiting the garden! We have found some nice organic granules that are
very foul smelling that keep the critters away. Each day depending on
weather, the SACC group is assisting in the garden by watering the vegetables.
The garden is making a great comeback.
The students are learning a great deal from the garden already as we
have seen nutritional connections being made with poetry, science connections
as well as some wonderful blogs being submitted. The students see how
gardening can impact so many areas of their learning. We look forward
as the students continue to learn and explore and share their findings.
May will
be extremely exciting as the students will be back in the garden planting
some of our warm weather plants such as basil, beans, carrots, corn,
cucumbers, marigolds, peppers, sweet potato, tomatoes, yellow squash,
zucchini squash and perhaps even a pumpkin. On May 12, we will hold
our GRAND OPENING event where many AHA, Government and FCPS officials
will come out and tour our garden. Please check out the website for
the latest pictures of activities going on in the garden and what is
growing!
Coming soon
– you and your family can sign up to care for the garden throughout
the summer. Keep an eye out for the sign up list to assist with the
care and harvesting of our crops!
