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Blossoming young minds

by mandy murray

Sheri Merritt and her fifth-grade students created a garden that bloomed into a school-wide phenomenon.

After designing a plan for a garden for her Lake Worth ISD campus, Merritt won the 2007 ATPE Grant for Teaching Excellence. The money she received through the grant paid for most of the necessary garden supplies and tools, while the labor and love needed to create the garden came from her Miller Elementary School students.

When work began on the project in the fall of the 2007-08 school year, Merritt was dismayed by the slow pace. Things picked up, however, when her Region 11 school district donated materials, including railroad ties, soil and a sprinkler system. This generosity allowed Merritt to spend more money on plants, butterflies and other materials needed to create the garden and keep it growing. Once the foundation for the garden had been laid, Merritt and her students planted the first round of plants. “It was entertaining to watch them shovel dirt and have competitions to see who could dig the better hole,” she says.

Winter caused a delay in the garden’s progress, but members of the school district’s maintenance department stepped in to save the day by protecting the plants with frost cover and watching over the plants while the school was on break. When spring came, Merritt ordered the second round of plants and added them to the garden. Ordering butterflies in their larval state allowed Merritt and her students to experience the caterpillar maturation process firsthand; they watched as the larva wrapped themselves in their cocoons and later emerged as butterflies.

“The students and I learned something interesting that none of us knew,” Merritt says. “When painted lady butterflies emerge from their cocoons, the extra color from their wings drips off onto the ground. We all panicked at first, thinking that the butterflies were somehow bleeding.”

Butterflies were released into the garden, where they were studied by students from different classrooms. “Many of the prekindergarten and first-grade teachers did butterfly units and asked if they could release their butterflies into the garden [as well],” Merritt says. “Others used it for Earth Day or for their plant units.” Everyone at the school is looking forward to using the garden in the years to come. “I think as the garden grows,” Merritt says, “so will the opportunities for new ideas and experiences to use with it.”

Merritt plans to continue to expand the garden, using her first-year knowledge as a learning tool. “I knew the garden would be a challenge,” she says. “However, I also knew that in the end the learning experience the garden would create for everyone would be a greater reward than just the simple plan I put to paper. After all, the garden was not just for my students and me. It was for my school, and that is exactly who enjoyed it.”

Look for the other 2007 Grant for Teaching Excellence winner’s story in the Winter 2008 ATPE News.
 

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