Disney Planet Challenge Garden Pull-Out Day

In order to “prepare the soil” for the new Native Plant Garden, ECS will be hosting a garden pull-out day Saturday, April 9.  All ECS families and community members are invited to attend and help with the removal of existing foliage, mulching, and weeding to prepare for new, native plants.  The event will take place from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. Please bring any tools you would be willing to share for the morning.   Thank you in advance for your help!

****Also, mark your calendar for the follow-up planting day Saturday, May 7.  

 We will be removing these shrubs.

 We are tagging certain native trees that already exist in the garden.

Experimenting with Native Plants

Last week we planted our native seeds.  Each student got to use one of our donated trays and select seeds to plant.  We labeled the trays and sorted them based on the amount of sunlight they required for healthy growth.  Check in to see our growth!!!

Seeds for the Growlab

We just got our Growlab! Emma's Grandma, Joanne Cosgrove, donated many different kinds of native plant seeds to our classroom.  We are excited to plant the seeds. From painted daisies to strawberry popcorn, all of the plants will be fun to observe!  We are very excited to plant next week!

Carter and Chris holding some of the seeds.

                                            Ajani and Tony holding more of the seeds.

Fashion with a Function

Help our project by buying one of our awareness raising t-shirts!!!  E-mail becky.craig@imagineschools.com or melanie.cowherd@imagineschools.com for more information.

Asher and Grace's Top 10 Reasons a Native Garden is Good for ECS

10. Fun in all seasons!
9. It will be a nice space to enjoy and relax
8. The community can learn about "planting native" in a fun way
7. It may seem like hard work, but it's fun to garden
6. ECS students can enjoy our garden
5. The garden will be fun for all ages
4. It is a great idea for the Disney Planet Challenge
3. ECS students can learn about native plants
2. The seeds from our garden will spread to Frick Park and more native plants will grow
1. We love gardens and being outside!

by Asher and Grace

Step 2: Refining our Idea

When we decided to do our project on invasive and native plants we watched a video clip about invasive plants.  It gave suggestions on what we could do to help prevent the spread of invasive plants.  At first we wanted to pull out all the invasive plants in Frick Park, but somebody pointed out how that idea would be too much work and not sustainable.  We couldn't go out and pull everyday.  We thought some more and decided we could have a native garden to teach about the importance of native plants. 

by Alex & Olivia S.

You can watch this video to see what we learned.



Plants Out of Place

video from: http://www.invasive.org/

Step 1: Choosing our Idea

First Mrs. Cowherd told us we were participating in the Disney Planet Challenge competition.  We were flaberguasted and excited to get started.  But she said, "Wait!  We have to read a story and choose a project."   We all agreed.  She read us Heros of the Environment by Harriet Rohmer to inspire us to see how kids can help the environment. 

by Omari

Some of our class went to ask the teachers and students for things that they thought needed to change in the environment and community. They thought of a lot of ideas. we made a list of ideas and voted on the top three. Then we did some reaserch on the top three and thought about what would make a good and sustaiable project. The winner was native and invasive plants.

by Emma H