nature play, school nature area

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An 'afterthought' in our creation of school gardens and nature spaces was the transformation of the rainwater detention pond, enlarged after a classroom expansion.  Two outstanding church volunteers planted bald cypress trees, horsetails and switchgrass, and the fun began.  With a Seed Grant from the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center, our children formed wildflower seedballs and transformed the banks with native wildflowers. A preschool child to whom the title 'detention pond' was incomprehensible, christened the area 'the Land Down Under'.

If we are 'pretend-nectaring' amid wildflowers as butterflies or bees, or performing routine water-quality tests, we take time to get to know and make friends with the nature right outside our door. 

Students in the K - 5th 'Rainbow Room' hands-on science and nature classes visit regularly.  As a site for wildlife observation, it can't be beat!  Our study of native plants and wildlife is truly place-based...for we only have to visit our little bit of nature right in our own schoolyard - the Land Down Under!