Lawson Preschool Cycles for Life

The children at Lawson Community Pre-School are developing life-long habits and attitudes to create a sustainable future. They are participating in hands on experiences to learn about food and waste cycles.

Growing vegetables

The Pre-school garden provides an ideal way for the children to be actively involved in growing their own vegetables and caring for them. Discussions about the importance of conserving water are a natural part of this process. Plans are currently underway to install a rainwater tank.

Composting

An interest in worms and what they eat gave staff the opportunity to introduce the children to worm farms and composting. The children were able to look at a working worm farm before setting up one for pre-school. During meal times discussions took place about what worms could and could not eat. It was decided to have two containers, one for food scraps (green) and one for the other rubbish (blue). A poster was made and soon all the children were sorting their food scraps and putting them into the appropriate container.

Enriching the garden

Guided by staff children take turns to feed the worms and empty the castings into a bucket to be returned to the garden. At present we are growing snow peas, carrots, strawberries and broccoli. We are looking forward to spring when our vegetables will be ready to pick and eat raw or used in cooking.

Future directions

We are looking at what goes into the blue container and will begin finding ways of reducing our rubbish. Children are already becoming familiar with the recycling symbol. We're also planning a waste audit and a visit to the local tip. The children will be able to understand the impacts of their unrecycled waste.

This item was posted in August 2006.