Speciality Highlight January 2026: Farm & Earth Education
Greetings Families,
It has been so nice to be back in our routines after the Winter Break. The crisp air has brought energy and busy excitement to the many different things happening throughout our weeks.
First Grade: Earth Education
The First Grade has fallen into a predictable rhythm each Friday after lunch for our compost chore. This practical work fosters a connection with nature and an understanding of environmental awareness. Most of the students seem proud that they are supporting their previous teacher with their compost buckets! We embark on a lovely, long nature walk to the other side of campus to the farm, where we dump our wheelbarrow at our compost area. Students enjoy taking turns trying to push the heavy weight and comparing how it feels once empty. Some afternoons end with a farm visit, while others end with field games and nature observations. Once a month, the students put on gloves and take part in a litter clean-up around the big playground and picnic tables at the end of our class block. Even this task turns into fun, where we use our wiggles and giggles to propel our work with positivity.
Second and Third Grade: Farming
Aside from our regular farm chores, we have been enjoying a clay building project, using natural clay and bamboo from around our campus’s creek bed to repair the farm’s goat hut roof. Students are reinforcing the raw clay with straw, which is mixed in to support the clay as it dries. New layers are added on warmer days (as our hands get very wet!). Luckily, many of our days have been quite warm, especially Tuesdays and Thursdays when we are at the farm late in the day. Students are beginning to brainstorm ideas for our main building project that will be completed before the end of the school year. So far, students have suggested a chicken playhouse or a tool storage shed! Additionally, the children were very tickled to find big carrots growing in the garden, and we learned how to identify carrot leaves among the weeds that have crept in. All are now very eager to plant more carrot seeds!
Fourth and Fifth Grade: Earth Education
The Fourth and Fifth Grade students have explored a variety of projects including eco-printing cotton fabric with rust water and plant tannins, whittling wooden animals, and most recently making individual greenhouses using recycled materials and compost from our farm to cold-start cool season vegetable seeds. We are now working on removing the Grades’ old treehouse railings, which we will repaint once the Middle Grades finish installing the new ones. After the weather warms up a bit, we will begin a new woodcarving project, as there is a strong interest in this area.
Middle Grades: Earth Education
Middle School has enjoyed farm visits, garden work, and woodcarving during our Earth Education block. The Eighth Graders carved wooden spreading knives while Sixth and Seventh completed “whittle people” peg dolls, some complete with tiny knit hats and scarves! Students are given an opportunity to choose their own small extra carving project if finished - a bird, a chess piece, and an attempt at a spoon were all seen this past month. Some students value the process more than the product and simply enjoy whittling a stick down to a smooth shape. Woodcarving supports a sense of calm focus, patience, willpower, and fine motor skills. It is also a comfortable and relaxed social time that gives the class a much-deserved break from their rigorous academics.
Sixth and Seventh Graders have been observing the farm animals and recording sketches of all angles to support their next handwork project, while Eighth Graders finished their carving projects. We have gone on several deep woods hikes and discovered a large fallen white oak tree to climb behind the farm, a deer skull, and the deep woods marsh path that leads from the farm back to the Grades platforms. The Eighth Graders are passing on their thorough knowledge of the hidden treasures on our campus that they’ve grown so familiar with. Most recently, we built a campfire and observed the process of turning a variety of natural materials into carbon to support the Chemistry Block. Students also created a humble branch fence around the pollinator garden bed by the farm to keep little feet out in preparation for Spring planting. In the coming weeks, we will continue more woodcarving with student-led project ideas and repair the railings on the Grades’ treehouse.
Take care,
Ki Heidi
