January 2016

The rain has brought so much more than water.

"Going on a field trip to Life Lab during a wild rainstorm was an incredible experience that will be remembered long after the the year passes. The 'Eating a Rainbow' curriculum was engaging and important for all my second and third grade students; however, what will be remembered most will be the journey of our senses through the magnificent garden. They got to feel the storm surround them, they got wet and muddy and loved it. Pulling vegetables, making warm soup, and searching for new wonders filled them up, leaving them perfectly content from a wondrous day."

~ Mary Thomas Pullen,
2nd/3rd Grade Teacher
Green Acres Elementary,
following January 19th field trip to the Life Lab Garden Classroom

February 2016

Giving kids the chance to try new fruits and vegetables in a fun garden environment can help them form lifelong healthy eating habits. These Hall District Elementary Students clearly enjoyed their new tasting experience at the Blooming Classroom this month! On their second visit they loved beets, too :-)

"Most of my students said all of the vegetables were new to them except the carrots, it just showed the variety of new things they got to taste."

- Ms. Morrison, 3rd Grade Teacher on a Feeling Fine With Fresh Foods Field Trip

March 2016

Helping Teachers Use Gardens As Dynamic Science Classrooms

We hosted 25 teachers for our Next Generation Science in the Garden workshop on March 11th at our Garden Classroom in Santa Cruz. Here is what they had to say about it:

"This workshop was far beyond what I'm doing now. This is what I'm striving for."

"I would recommend this workshop to everyone who teaches and wants to connect kids, gardens and Next Generation Science."

"We did the flower dissection lesson on Monday morning - the kids really enjoyed it."

~ Watsonville Garden Teacher Sue Foreson, who shared a Life Lab lesson with her students the next school day after the workshop.

Garden-based science is a rich opportunity for young students of all learning styles, and particularly for those that sometimes struggle in traditional indoor classrooms. That's why we mapped our curriculum to the new science standards and train educators on how to use school gardens for lessons aligned to Next Generation Science (and to Common Core math and language arts standards).

Life Lab trainers have also shared our knowledge, experience and unique resources with hundreds of educators in 12 other garden-based science, nutrition and environmental education workshops already this year - in Santa Cruz, Watsonville, Berkeley, San Francisco, and Visalia, CA, as well as in Georgia, Pennsylvania, and the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma. Training teachers helps us impact the lives and learning of more than 200,000 students each year now!