Green thumbs aplenty can be found at Maggie Brown Middle School.
Students recently planted an assortment of fruits and vegetables in their school garden, which sits in a patch of grass located at the back of their campus at 32 Clark St.
Principal Dwight McDaniel introduced the garden to provide a hands-on learning experience for students.
“I started talking with my science teacher about doing more hands-on experiments with the kids. I’m a gardener, so I decided — we have a lot of space out here, I’ll just start working out there with a couple of kids,” McDaniel said.
They started small, but over the course of three years, the garden grew and now features several raised boxes, planters and cages.
With Autumn quickly approaching, the garden is full of falltime produce such as squash, sweet potatoes and collard greens, but features other mainstays like tomatoes and green peppers.
Many of the kids at Maggie Brown have never gardened before, McDaniel said, so the school garden is a great way to introduce them to the hobby.
“I’d say probably 90 percent of them have never gardened or grown anything from scratch. So it’s very interesting to watch them go in the garden and plant these seeds and two, three weeks later, they’re like, ‘Wow, I’ve never seen a carrot grow in real life,” McDaniel said.
McDaniel said the garden is also a great way to encourage proper conduct in students. While it’s not treated as an incentive, students who display consistent good behavior and perform well in class are often treated to a trip to the garden once or twice a week.
“It’s expected that you come here and you do the right things. Then in life, sometimes, if you do things right consistently, you will get a reward. Sometimes you get a promotion, sometimes you get a raise. Sometimes, you know, the karma just falls your way, and things happen,” McDaniel said.
The gardening sessions also give teachers the chance to chat with students outside of class and gauge how they’re feeling, McDaniel said. When it’s harvest time, their yield is often cooked in class, and students are taught how to prepare each crop.
Since students generally return to their base schools after one or two nine-week periods, most don’t see the fruits of their labor — but that hasn’t deterred their enthusiasm.
“I find learning how to work with the plants very interesting and calming,” student Kamora Wygant said. “It’s not that easy to work with plants. It’s not just a quick job. It does take more skills and knowledge working with the plants.”
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