Cultivating their own garden

Nursery School plans for fall harvest

Young children have always enjoyed digging in the dirt, but that activity took on new meaning at the Elisabeth W. Amen Nursery School this spring as children and teachers worked together to create a vegetable garden on the school grounds.

School Director Marge Werner and the teachers have been entertaining the idea of creating a vegetable garden for a few years, and this spring they decided the time was "ripe." With a letter of support from President Ronald A. Crutcher, the school applied for and received the Wuzzleburg Preschool Garden Award from the National Gardening Association to support the creation of a small vegetable garden. While there is no cash award attached to the grant, it does provide essential tools for the project including gardening gloves for the children and an assortment of seeds.

The planning, digging and planting of raised beds behind the school provided a lot of hands-on fun as well as many teachable moments related to nature, the life cycle of plants and environmental stewardship.

On April 23, President Crutcher visited the nursery school to break ground for the garden. The children were excited to have the president on hand as they released the last batch of butterflies they had hatched this spring. Moving over to the marked garden plot, the children gathered around to watch President Crutcher begin the digging. As he worked, they offered advice and made suggestions as to what they wanted to plant.

The small garden will include a variety of vegetables, including potatoes, carrots, squash and pumpkins that the children can observe growing and harvest in the fall. During the summer, when school is not in session, the garden will be maintained by Werner, who is a Norton resident, as well as President Crutcher and the families of the nursery school students.

This is just one of many activities the school has undertaken to teach its students about science and the environment. Every spring, campus greenhouse caretaker Jane Young visits the nursery school to pot small plants with the students. This annual event is an interactive lesson in plant propagation for the budding scientists. As they learn about spores, cones and seeds, students fill a small pot with soil, then plant and water cuttings. The children take their new plants home with an information sheet on how to care for them.

Young enjoys working with the children on this project. "They are enthusiastic, inquisitive, and energetic," she says. "It is fun keeping them focused on the task at hand and interacting with them in such a way as to keep them interested."

The preschool students are naturally interested in plants and animals, so they enjoy learning about how things grow and taking care of them. Although this is the first time the school has taken on a project of this scope, it engages in nature-related projects throughout the year. Every year, students hatch butterflies in special nets and feed them oranges and sugar water. They also plant grass in small cups. There are flower beds planted under the windows that the children care for in order to attract birds.

"We also take many walks on campus, and the children watch the trees and flowers bud and bloom," said Werner, who hopes that spreading environmental consciousness will encourage people to grow more of their own food. The families of students are enthusiastic about the project, contributing funds and supplies for the garden.

Having grown up in Colorado during World War II, Werner developed a love of plants through her family's Victory Garden. She recalls that during the war, "everyone had a Victory Garden and there were sugar rations. Our kids miss that in today's culture, so it's really a good experience for them."

Knowing that "little kids are born scientists," Werner and her staff want to help the children develop an appreciation for homegrown foods by nurturing their own plants and harvesting their crops in the fall.

The Elisabeth W. Amen Nursery School has been affiliated with Wheaton College since 1931.