Ethridge ES Sows Seeds From $2,500 Garden Grant
Article Date: Novemebr 13, 2008
Teachers and students at Ethridge Elementary School recently got back to work on their discovery garden, funded through a $2,500 grant from the Texas Department of Agriculture.
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Elizabeth Farrier, a special education teacher at the campus, submitted the grant proposal last school year and planted the garden last spring. She is excited about the opportunity to help students from all five grades visualize both scientific and mathematical processes.
"There has been a lot of hands-on practice which lets the students watch and learn, then apply what they’ve discovered,” Farrier said. “We’ve planted five gardens – one for each campus – and sectioned them into nine, one-square yard blocks. Measuring the plots, monitoring growth, planting vegetables last spring and winterizing the plants this fall – all of that will help them with science vocabulary and math skills.”
Farrier’s grant has been highlighted in the classrooms of Andrea Kleckner and Sara Webb, both science teachers. Kleckner’s fifth grade students have become the garden’s official irrigation team while other Ethridge employees got involved by bringing family members to the campus for a Sept. 6 “plant day.”
“Husbands and wives were up here one weekend digging holes and planting shrubs and trees,” said Tina Vaughan, counselor at Ethridge. “This has been a wonderful opportunity for each of our students to do something that many don’t have the chance to do at home, and the teachers have really embraced the whole process and made it work.”