Come to the Table of Plenty

Today was the second day full day of school, and we started it in the garden. The garden project was new to my school last year, and the beds were all planted in the spring and well tended over the summer. My class was blessed to be the very first class to have a garden session with Miss Maren from Seattle Tilth this school year. She gave them a very poignant visual representation of the amount of farmable soil on the earth with an apple. She ended up with the peel of one sixty-fourth of the apple, or the peel of 3.125% of an apple. (Both of those figures were proudly proclaimed by students of mine during the demonstration, and accurate to the demonstration.)

It was very fun to watch the students exploring the changes in the garden since June and work together to record their observations. One student found a zucchini that was "at least two pencils long" and another one was impressed with the observable changes in a raspberry from a flower to a slimy white protrusion through a green fruit to a fresh, pink berry. Students also played with water droplets on leaves and "painted" with fungus growing in the garden. It was an amazing way to spend the first period of the day.

Later students jumped into the more traditional practice of pre-assessments to drive placement and instruction for the first trimester of the year. But as they finished up, they were given free reign to read, draw, or find another quiet, non-distracting activity to fill their time. Several boys decided to make use of the new reading corner, which was one of those soul-filling teacher moments.

"Come to the Table of Plenty" was last year's school theme. But after a weekend spent at PAX West with my family, on a date night with my husband, and uploading my finally finished newest short story for Kindle publication, I feel my cup is overflowing and my table is abundantly blessed. This is going to be a fantastic year!