Exploring (and Tasting) in The Garden

This week, we got to spend some time in the SMS Wolves' Green Growing Lab to do some exploring, writing, drawing, and even some tasting!

We walked around the garden with our clipboards, papers, and pencils, and we each wrote about or drew three things we noticed. 

We noticed a lot of different crops growing, including squash, peppers, corn, beans, and tomatoes along with all different kinds of flowers!

Everyone got to try a few cherry tomatoes, which were sweet and delicious! We all agreed that food tastes even better when its grown by you and your community :) We are excited to spend lots and lots of time in the garden this year, and we can't wait to get out there again!

Sprouting into Spring!

We are saying goodbye to winter and hello to spring, and our lima beans are doing the same!

 Many of our beans began to sprout up through the soil this week and are beginning to make their way up towards their castles. 

In addition to the learning Ms. Riley did at school on Friday, she was also sure to give all the beans a good drink of water before the weekend :) Hopefully a few more beans will sprout over the weekend! 

Bean Sprouts!

On Friday, we took one last look at our lima bean greenhouses before sending them home. While some are still taking a bit longer to grow, others have entered into the seedling stage with a tiny stem and leaves to boot! 

We took a closer look at many of our beans using our document camera, it was so cool to see them up close on the big projector screen! We talked about why some of the beans might not have grown as fast, and these were some of our thoughts:

• they didn't have enough air or water
• they had too much water
• maybe some beans are older and some are younger
• the way the paper towel was folded might have affected the amount of light getting to the bean

We hope many of the beans continue to grow at home! Beans with a lot of roots or a stem could be transplanted into a small cup with a hole for drainage and some soil that could be left on a sunny windowsill. Unfortunately, Ms. Riley's bean did indeed have too much water and instead of growing roots, it grew a bit of mold. Hopefully she has better  luck with the other plants in our classroom!! :)