Bringing Nature To Our Concrete Jungle!
Vision
Through planting and creating spaces for wildlife, our vision and hope is to nurture opportunities to not only become caretakers of the land around us, but that these meaningful encounters will have a lasting impact on the way we value Indigenous knowledge, history and traditions throughout or lives. We want this space to have a positive impact for our Kindergarten Program and that the learning which comes through this space, will grow from them, into their families and our school community as a whole. Our hope is that this action project will foster the Two Eyed Seeing – the relationship with what is around us, coupled with the Indigenous truths and knowledges.
We started this project with the believe that our connection to the land and our Earth is more important than ever. We want our students, and the next generations, to understand the critical importance of environmental sustainability and the importance of our relationship to the land (i.e., plant identification, traditional uses of plants, the Indigenous traditions, perspectives, sustainability, etc.). Our students love being outside and respectfully observing and interacting with nature. Our students were inspired to create an outdoor space where they could connect to and better understand the land that we are on.
Action
– Created a plan (blueprint) with our kindergarten students
– Worked in close collaboration with the DCDSB Indigenous Resource Team
– Sourced and purchased native to Ontario perennial plants & learned about their traditional Indigenous uses
– Worked with other classes to fill our outdoor classroom planters with the topsoil we purchased.
– Planted 15 Ontario Native plants. Students wanted to select pollinator-friendly plants. Our plants provide nectar and pollen for hummingbirds, butterflies, and bees!
– Purchased gravel to use for french draining system – We have a lot of low areas in our yard that often flood and pool with water. One of these areas is where we would like to have our community circle (using stumps and donated lumber for seating). To fix the drainage issues we dug a trench, set a pipe drain in the trench, covered it with the gravel we purchased and back filled it with topsoil – ultimately creating a french drainage system.
– Purchased a Dogwood tree to have in the middle of our community circle (we learned that dogwood was traditionally used by Indigenous Peoples for making bows, arrows, and knitting needles. The bark can be used to make red dye).