Vision

Our vision is to create a new outdoor classroom for our school community to use by placing armour stones around an existing raised garden. As part of this vision, the raised garden will be re-vamped to include both vegetables and native pollinator plants.

Action

The stones were donated by one of our families and then a local company was hired to move the stones to the school yard. We got permission from the school board to place the stones “randomly” on the yard, and at least 2m apart from each other, from the trees, and from the fence. The grade 5 Water Rocker students planned where the stones should go and they marked the spots for the landscaping company. On Thursday, March 31st, 2022, Gerber Landscaping delivered and placed the Armour Stones around the raised garden. They exceeded our expectations and the students at the school love using these stones during class times and recesses. Next, the Water Rockers created plans for re-vamping the raised garden. They researched local vegetables that are harvested in late summer. They also researched native flowers, no bigger than 60 cm in height. As a class, they looked at their different garden designs and chose one that they could agree on. Their garden plans involve rows of carrots, beets, broccoli, and cabbage. Around the perimeter, they will be planting and alternating Nodding Wild Onion and Wild Columbine. The planting of the garden will be happening in May. They will create a schedule to make sure that the new area is watered and weeded. The garden will be harvested when school starts again in September 2022. What a fantastic new space for our school and community members to use!!!

Reflection & Celebration

The garden vegetables and flowering plants are being planted in May. Once they are planted, the Water Rockers will celebrate the new outdoor pollinator classroom area at Kortright Hills P.S. with a party and a picnic! Because the stones were donated and no digging was involved, this was a very easy and inexpensive way to create a brand new outdoor classroom area for our school. Connecting it to our love of pollinators and our pollinator/vegetable garden, added a neat element to this outdoor classroom!