Every year at Eagle Rock Elementary, Ms. Stanco’s 5th grade magnet classes raises and then releases Painted Lady butterflies in the spring. Now, thanks to our #livingclassroom , the kids can actually visit the butterflies for a few days as they nectar on site. AND, if you look closely, you can even see a tiny Sweat bee (Halictus tripartitus) joiner this beauty on our native Sunflower (Encelia californica).
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Indigenous #livingclassrooms are no-brainers, offering our kids and communities powerful contexts for the places they call home while amplifying biodiversity, promoting positive mental health, sequestering carbon and infiltrating water on site. It’s all one GIANT WIN/WIN!
HABITAT PROJECTS IN HIGH SPEED!
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If you weren’t at the ERE Nature Club today you missed a BANGER of a day. Habitat elements were built, lessons were learned and sticks and mud were front and center.
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Go @eregreenteam , go kids, go EARTH!!!
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#wildclassroomproject #wholecommunitycurriculum #environmentalliteracy #mud #sticks
The Wild Classroom Project has one goal:
To redefine community in order to create stronger communities.
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Our lesson titles are simple, but our lessons have teeth..and wings…and antennae…and pistils…and rhizomes….etc
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#wholecommunitycurriculum #stewardship #agency #earthdayeveryday
TOMORROW:
Extremely excited to have the EAGLE ROCK ELEMENTARY native classroom on this very cool living classroom tour of schools in the Gabriel Valley and Northeast Los Angeles.
The garden at EAGLE ROCK ELEMENTARY will be open from nine to one, entrance at the intersection of Chickasaw and Casper streets here in Eagle rock.
We will be discussing our “whole community curriculum“, living classroom design, and looking to connect with other people, parents and nonprofits in the area, all striving to give our kids a finer sense of place and empower them with stewardship.
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Admission is FREE! LINK in BIO
The Planet Is Not Waiting…
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This is for all the luminescent humans I have met and get to work alongside, and all the non-humans who have tolerated my ongoing need to get closer to them all.
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And of course, a giant bear hug to @eaglerockelementary and @tolandwaypta for knowing the value of introducing our kids to where they live and embracing our work the way you have. Two down countless millions to go, but. The Whole Community Curriculum LIVES!!!
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All📸 @dnpix@wildyardsproject
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Some of my greatest partners and teachers are missing from this post, but please know that I know who you are, and am able to say that you all are players in the greatest time of my life. Thank you. Now back to work!
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#everydayisearthday #notimelikethepresent #wholecommunity #livingschoolyards #urbanhabitat
The Toland Way Elementary Living Classroom is back! .
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@sequesteredjester and I have pruned and prepped, wildflowers and perennials are waking up, and Spring Classes are in session.
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@wildclassroomproject K-6th #livingschoolyard curriculum getting fine tuned and stress tested by all the good kids of #nela . Huge props to @tolandwaypta@eaglerockpta and our unbeatable @eregreenteam
Leaving Home Ain’t Easy…
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….just ask any Leaf-Cutter Bee. But here in the @eregreenteam@wildclassroomproject #livingclassroom , they know there’s a lot of work to do, and plenty of native, #pollinatorfriendly plants to get work with.
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The pollinators are on it, folks.
Protection
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The other day, one of our fourth graders was peering closely at our Rhus integrifolia, and asked aloud, “why are the baby leaves red?”
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And the truth is, I wasn’t entirely sure. I figured it had something to do with a pigment that was visible when the leaf was too young to produce chlorophyll, but it’s a little more endearing than that.
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Holding up his phone, CCAC Fellow and @wildclassroomproject wonderboy, @microplastics.enjoyer announced: “The chemical the plant is producing is called, Anthocyanin, and it’s there to protect the young, tender leaf from the ultraviolet ray of the sun until it is mature enough to produce chlorophyll and start making sugar.”
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Seen here are a few of our keystone essential plants utilizing anthocyanin to protect their baby solar collectors until they’re mature enough to start supporting life as we know it. Thank you Plants, and nice save, @microplastics.enjoyer !!!!
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Pictured:
1. Malosma laurina- Laurel Sumac
2. Mahonia repens- Dwarf Mahonia
3. Rhus integrifolia- Lemonade berry
