The Class 3 curriculum places particular focus on gardening throughout the year. Every week, Class 3P spends one morning, of our Main Lesson time, gardening with Nadia. Harvesting information and newly acquired knowledge from these sessions is then documented in each child’s 'Grow Garden Grow' Main Lesson book.
Every year, the Mullumbimby Farmer’s Market runs an event for local Primary Schools called Grow Your Own Lunchbox, in which the children harvest produce from their school garden, prepare a variety of dishes and then present these at the market as a nutritious school lunchbox. The children prepared several of their dishes in the school kitchen the day before the market and included pickles and preserves made over the last couple of months.
We served chicken and spinach quiche, Madagascar Bean salad, Brazilian turmeric rice, native raspberries, cherry tomatoes, beetroot relish, pickled lime and cassava cake. Yum!
It was a very interesting experience to think and work like farmers throughout this process. It’s not as easy as popping into the supermarket to buy produce - we had to rely on Mother Nature to provide the right conditions for our plants to grow and be ready for harvesting. We discovered that not everything works to a plan. We were hoping to harvest our wheat at the beginning of the term, but due to the wet weather, it was too damp to harvest so we could not make any bread or flour items for the market.
All the children were very proud of their creations. They were fortunate enough to receive two awards at the Market that celebrated their efforts: the Lunchbox Snack Award for their cassava cake with native raspberries, and the Abundant Native School Garden Award. We would like to thank Nadia for all her preparation and planning to ensure the produce was ready to harvest in time for this event.
Penny Martin
Class 3 Teacher
Every year, the Mullumbimby Farmer’s Market runs an event for local Primary Schools called Grow Your Own Lunchbox, in which the children harvest produce from their school garden, prepare a variety of dishes and then present these at the market as a nutritious school lunchbox. The children prepared several of their dishes in the school kitchen the day before the market and included pickles and preserves made over the last couple of months.
We served chicken and spinach quiche, Madagascar Bean salad, Brazilian turmeric rice, native raspberries, cherry tomatoes, beetroot relish, pickled lime and cassava cake. Yum!
It was a very interesting experience to think and work like farmers throughout this process. It’s not as easy as popping into the supermarket to buy produce - we had to rely on Mother Nature to provide the right conditions for our plants to grow and be ready for harvesting. We discovered that not everything works to a plan. We were hoping to harvest our wheat at the beginning of the term, but due to the wet weather, it was too damp to harvest so we could not make any bread or flour items for the market.
All the children were very proud of their creations. They were fortunate enough to receive two awards at the Market that celebrated their efforts: the Lunchbox Snack Award for their cassava cake with native raspberries, and the Abundant Native School Garden Award. We would like to thank Nadia for all her preparation and planning to ensure the produce was ready to harvest in time for this event.
Penny Martin
Class 3 Teacher