Summary
The Armidale Waldorf School is 25 years old and was founded by a group of parents who had a strong interest in Rudolf Steiner’s view on education. It began with 6 students in kindergarten and has now to 130 students from K-8. In keeping with Steiner’s views, a vegetable garden has been a part of the education since the schools inception and has always been organic in its management.
Purpose
The gardening program is aimed at building in the students a connection to food production and an awareness of the social and health giving benefits of the practice of gardening and the delights of eating home grown food. It is empowering for a young person to collect seed, plant, harvest and cook food which they enjoy. It brings to them a sense of their own abilities and possibility of taking other steps in their lives as their strength and confidence grows through the success they achieve in real life tasks.
The lesson plans brought new ideas and more of a structure to the program we had been running for some years.
Challenges/Issues
The biggest challenge we face is finding the right person to work in the garden and with the classes. It requires a commitment to organic practices, recycling of materials and innovation of ideas and there have been periods of time when such a person has not come forward, however, we currently have such a person, and she has increased the children’s engagement, enjoyment and interest in gardening threefold by her passion and knowledge and through her creativity in finding new ways to involve the students in the process.
The people who held the vision for the garden being central to the school over the years and have seen gardening as a core activity for the students have had to ‘go into bat’ for it at times, especially if money was needed, or a new building was being planned and the site was being eyed off. Non-gardeners can hold the view that it is ‘just a garden’ and so can be easily relocated, without appreciating the effort in building the soil profile over the years on our difficult site and the sense of place and focus it provides for the community. Hopefully it is now seen more widely for the treasure it is in building self-confidence, self-reliance, group and individual social skills and students overall sense of well-being by developing a positive attitude to the environment and that it will be supported going into the future.
Program Outcomes
The BFA Organic School Gardens Program injected new ideas and impetus into our program and helped us to formalise what we have been doing for some time. Even in our school community there are children whose families do not garden or connect with the environment in a hands-on-way as our modern lives speed up and screen entertainment rolls on so this regular process of gardening provides the only point of connection to food production and for many the natural environment. The use of garden produce in our weekly tuckshop builds pride and a sense of satisfaction in their efforts, and builds and strengthens the student’s attitudes and skills to begin, continue and complete tasks, skills which are transferable to other elements of their lives as they grow.
We also view the element of environmental stewardship as being one of the key outcomes of a regular gardening program, especially when combined with Landcare style of activities in the school grounds and a wider community. Only from a heart felt connection to the environment and our interconnection with it can create a real desire to protect it come and while it looks like a simple garden, its function is much greater. I believe this happens to a greater level if it is an accepted practice rather than a ‘program’ that comes and goes, or is done as a one-off to meet an outcome. In building the garden into the very life of the school over time has increased the effectiveness of the program.
Next Steps
As I was writing the lesson evaluations for the program I thought of many other ways there could be further integration between the activity of the gardening and activities within the classroom. This added richness of course depends on the teacher’s own creativity and interest in the process and a belief that it will achieve the outcomes spoken above. There are many more picture books which could be used as a pre or post gardening resource, especially in the younger years, and poetry appreciation and writing activities for the older students, a weekly diary of activities, what the student liked doing, what they saw, observation of seasonal changes, writing of songs, growing and making products, - value adding - as a way of funding a project like a solar panel for a water pump ect. it would also be good to develop a connection between other community groups or individuals to further build the sense of gardening being an important real-life function for the students and adults alike.
*This text is an exceprt from The Armidale Waldorf School learning story