Urban Harvest and Hands On Learning Students

Hands-On Learning and Urban Harvest – Designing the Applied Learning Garden

Planning and preparations are in full swing in the ESC Applied Learning Garden. This is an exciting and collaborative outdoor learning space where the Year 11 and 12 Urban Harvest and Hands-On Learning students are working together to design a sustainable school garden. During Term One, students have undertaken site preparation, after two years of Covid-lockdowns the garden was overgrown with weeds, so clearing the garden, organising the tool shed and taking a stocktake of the tools and seeds were some of the jobs the students tackled. Students also began sowing vegetable seedlings and beneficial flowers. Stay tuned for more exciting updates during Semester Two, as students will be cultivating their mathematical, science and business skills as they will be: 

• Exploring measurement when designing a site plan, constructing the raised garden beds, creating bottle gauges to measure and graph rainfall,
• Calculating volume to work out the amount of soil required, 
• Testing the soil’s acidity levels (PH) levels and graphing the results,
• Investigating the biology behind “green” initiatives such as composting,
• Maintaining a garden budget on Excel and determining what the total cost is of vegetables they grow verses what they retail for.
• Exercising social enterprising skills when donating produce to community food collectives for people in need. 

Additionally, various Art classes within the college will be contributing to the Applied Learning Garden by creating murals and garden art. 

Rosa Neri – VCAL Urban Harvest Teacher and Tony Panozzo -  Hands-on Learning Facilitator.