Impact of our vegetable garden...thanks to KPMG Volunteers

04.04.2019

Our vegetable garden has grown amazingly well! And so has the impact of gardening on our children, teachers and school...Kudos to KPMG volunteers who helped us with starting this initiative...

As written by our Trustee, Mrs Sabita Currimbhoy:

Recently we have engaged Ms. Suganya S. to help with what she calls "School Transformational Systems".. well one thing led to another and with the gardening boost that KPMG has also given us, one of our teachers has taken this to another level with her interest in both her class and gardening.. here is a report of this teacher. Thought you would like to know and see how small moments and changes can transform lives.. thanks to KPMG for being a part of this change..

A Snippet of impact we are seeing in our classrooms

Young, Energetic Grade 1 students are Learning by Gardening! Our Grade 1 students are stepping out of their classrooms, soaking up some sun, planting seeds and watering their plants to their heart’s content!Ms. Revathi, a primary school Tamil teacher at Gurukulam School is showing the way for all of us to follow by trying different hands-on learning activities to help her students have fun and grow as inquisitive learners.

While attending a training workshop in the school, Ms.Revathi had an opportunity to share the passion she has for teaching and also think about her ‘dream classroom’. Her dream classroom, as she articulated it, was a space which had a gardening corner and an activity corner where children are happy and learning by doing.

Fast-forward a week post the workshop, Ms.Revathi was making her dream classroom a reality one step at a time. Together with her young and energetic Grade 1 kids, they were preparing a garden patch right adjacent to their classroom, fermenting the soil and planting seeds -- they were creating a beautiful garden-corner

“I got this idea to create a garden when we shared about our ‘dream classroom’ the other day. While I still do not know how to go about the activity corner, I thought I will start with the garden corner -- something that I can do towards contributing to my dream classroom” -- Ms. Revathi

As a morning routine, everyday her students watered the plants, cleaned the garden patch and ensured carefully that nothing caused harm or danger to their patch. What caught Ms.Revathi by surprise was that her students were taking ownership by themselves (without anyone asking them to) to grow and take care of their garden. And through all this, Ms.Revathi realized and experienced that these simple activities go a long way in establishing a relationship with children beyond the classroom walls.

As the beautiful garden grew, with flowers blooming and the first vegetable appearing, there was visible joy and excitement in her classroom. Ms.Revathi leveraged this opportunity and organized a ‘Discussion Time’ with her students. This discussion time helped the children reflect on how they felt while they were gardening, what they had learnt about plants and their growth and how the entire experience was.

“I am really happy seeing how much my kids enjoy gardening. Everyday, they themselves ensure that the garden work is done. And with so much excitement and pride, they show it to others as well. I also observed growth in my students -- they started engaging with me a lot more. They also take ownership to do their job and this is something I never expected. Even the kid with whom I have found difficult to work with before has shown so much care and behaviour towards gardening. I also had a discussion with them about the garden and they themselves shared with me how plants grow -- that they need soil, sunlight and water. Without me explaining, all my kids knew the concept!” -- Ms.Revathi

Ms.Revathi is truly a powerhouse of ideas when it comes to helping her kids with creativity and extra-effort. Her plan ahead is to share her experience with her peer-teachers on how this helped her build relationships with her kids and how it was a powerful yet fun learning experience for her kids too. She also has plans to continue to grow and sustain the garden, leveraging it to promote collaborative learning among the children.