Garden Project - December 2009

Our Lovely School

Skerries Educate Together N.S. is a lovely School located in Kelly's Bay, right beside the sea with marvelous sea views.

A great team of teachers and educators guide and teach our children on a daily basis.
Parents are also really welcome to help make a difference in the daily school life.

Educators and parents working in harmony with each other for the benefits of the children and their future.

Green school: Green Flag

Skerries Educate Together N.S. has started on the Green-Schools programme: the 3 Rs : Reduce/Reuse/Recycle, which educate the children about their environment, the Earth and how to care and respect for it ecologically. The children are now busy bees working to get their green flags...

Making a difference to help care and protect our Earth seems to be of a great importance to our children (they all tell us about wash loads/reusing/water consumption etc...back from school).Well done teachers for caring so much and for educating our children so well on this important matter... The love and positive energy the teachers give on this subject is picked up so highly by our children and understood by them so well... Thank you so much Teachers...

The link

Everything we do including what we buy and what we eat, where it comes from, has it travelled from afar? (Food Mile), has it been sprayed with a lot of chemicals?, has it been vacuum packed prepared for weeks of travel where freshness might prevail with "the look" upon arrival - however a considerable loss of vitamins, minerals and goodness is an actual fact? Has it been considerably packaged with an overuse of unnecessary packaging?, everything is linked together and therefore has an impact on each other.

There are so many questions that one might ask themselves and it has become more and more popular now for people to get involved in growing their own fruits and vegetables... Community gardens and allotments have been set up quite regularly to accommodate the growing demand of those whishing to grow their own fruits and vegetables.

The lives of our Grandparents are not so distant after all... I would say we all remember the fresh Green beans, tomatoes, peppers, apples etc... from our parent's and grandparent's gardens...

Do you remember how tasty it felt in your mouth, livening your taste buds, giving vibrancy to your eyes with wonderful colors...
Do you remember the feeling of taking the peas out of their pods?, the fresh smells of greens emanating from it, our senses becoming alive, how it felt to touch nature and be part of the process?

Our Garden Project

A wonderful project has seen the light of creativity and is in the progress of full creation: An Organic Garden growing Vegetables and Fruits within the school.
The parents meet every Friday morning at 11:00 am in the Parachute Cafe to discuss progression on the garden.

Both children and parents are excited about this project as it is providing a great education for the kids about their nutrition/Health/Ecology/Environmental issues/Local wildlife/weather/sensory discovery/observation/working together/learning patience, meditation/the nature of life itself by planting seeds and watching them grow into seedlings and further into plants giving flowers which will then be ready to be eaten as a fruit or a vegetable, fresh from the ground, full of flavors, goodness and colors.

We have had a few meetings now since the start of the school year, we discussed possible funding available, we discussed the set up of the garden and which is the best way to move forward... for the children.

A great team of parents is already meeting, every one of whom is bringing valuable skills and information to make this project a success, with many more parents to join bringing even more skills...

Preparation and careful planning is the key to success when it comes to gardening (and everything else!!!!!!) coupled with experience, support and team work.
Though, it's all about having fun, connecting with nature, educating our children, meeting a lot of like minded friends and harvesting the fruits of our rewarding Team work...

January will see the physical start of the project with the labor commencing.
Plan of action/gathering of final information/Preparation/Set up/Digging/preparing the Earth/importing the soil/landscaping the garden/ getting final advice from the experienced and the experts etc... A lot of fun work coming. We will be busy bees ourselves…

There is so much to consider: Vegetable Garden, Wildlife Garden, Bird Nests, Wildflowers, so much planning... It's all exciting...

There will be so much more good news to come on these next blank pages... It's all yet to be written, until then wishing everyone a wonderful holiday & many happy wishes.