Signs of spring at the Kennedy School

After the long, cold, snowy winter it's hard to believe that spring is here. Even after spending the winter under many feet of snow, garlic in the Kennedy School garden is starting to peek through the soil. Can you see the green?

Garlic sprouting in the Kennedy School Garden

The garlic was planted last fall by Roxanne Scrima's Kindergarten class. They waited patiently all winter to see if their garlic cloves would sprout. Today they visited the garden and planted more seeds in class.

We began our lesson by learning about plant parts and what seeds need to grow. We even pretended to be seeds! Then we looked at seeds from different plants: flowers, herbs, greens and fruits.

Students described the seeds first. The calendula seed looked like a worm or a snail. Many students thought the basil resembled coffee grounds. One student said it looked like "a period at the end of a sentence." Others pointed out that the mesclun was a mixture of seeds and not just one type. No one guessed that we would be planting cucumbers - they thought the seeds were from sunflowers and pumpkins. And no one had seen a yellow cucumber before! The cucumber seeds will live in the kindergarten classroom until they germinate.

Content and photos provided by Karyn Novakowski, PEP Grant Nutrition Education Coordinator

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