Laurelhurst Elementary Garden
- 4530 46 Avenue NE
Seattle WA 98105 map - (206) 252-5400
- Website
- Contact: Elise Hart
Laurelhurst Elementary has a 50 square foot, raised garden bed located at the SW corner of the school grounds. Several teachers use the garden as a hands-on learning environment. Last summer, students and staff from Laser, a non-profit childcare facility at the school, tended the garden. Throughout the summer and fall, students worked with staff to harvest tomatoes, peas, beans, sunflowers and pumpkins. During the winter, children and adults weeded the garden, pulling out existing plants as they completed their growing cycle and added this material to a compost bin located adjacent to the garden. Students also planted bulbs and Winter Heather. As the weather warmed up, Laser kids helped start different vegetables and fruits such as tomatoes, pumpkins, potatoes and lettuce inside the school from seed and then transplanted the seedlings into the garden. In the Spring, student plant more vegetables, fruits and flowers and help with weeding and maintenance of the garden.
“Wow! I thought this was going to be really boring and its actually fun!”
The garden began as part of a school-wide nutrition initiative that was started in the Spring of 2005. Parents engaged with the nutrition initiative assisted a second grade teacher with a soils unit. Our hope is to have other teachers include the garden in their lessons, and to look to our nutrition committee for help and resources.
If you have time or resources to share, we can use seeds, children’s gloves, tools to amend the soil, shovels, children’s magnifying glasses, and ideas for garden lessons.
We could also use volunteers to water and maintain the garden in the summer. As more teachers want to be in the garden with their students, we will welcome more volunteers who have experience gardening with children to help us.
