The 1st Visit to the Garden for Ms. Connor's Class

Today Ms. Connor's class visited the edible garden for the first time. They introduced themselves and gave the name of their favorite vegetables.

We next reviewed the parts of a plant using an illustration that I'd made of a broccoli plant. The parts are roots, stem, leaf, fruit, seeds and flower. Using food donated by Gelson's, the kids identified the vegetables and stated what part of the plant is eaten. (We discussed that beet roots are most commonly eaten but that stems and greens are also eaten. We also discussed that the stem and flower of broccoli are eaten.) Since children in other classes had mistaken beets for radishes, we compared the two.

The children copied an illustration of a plant and labeled it or made their own illustration and labeled it. Afterwards they enjoyed a salad that volunteers had made with corn, lettuce, carrots, tomatoes, broccoli, celery and beets. The salad had a lemon olive oil vinaigrette.

The children enjoyed watching a monarch butterfly caterpillar that was on a milkweed plant in the butterfly garden.