Miss Ayala’s School Garden Plots
Posted in Children's Education on April 2 2015, by Plant Talk
Marissa Ayala is a school garden pioneer, at least in the eyes of her students and colleagues at Muscota New School in Manhattan.
Ayala had taken informational gardening courses before, but needed to polish how she tied gardening skills back to K–5 science curriculum. So, she enrolled in School Gardening 101 in February this year at The New York Botanical Garden. She wanted to get to know other educators who share her mission and to gain NYBG staff expertise to elevate her knowledge and ability to instruct a more rigorous curriculum.
“I wanted to make sure the garden was used in as meaningful a way as it could be,” she said.
Her biggest takeaway was the idea of intentionality; her students investigate specific scientific concepts on each visit to their garden plots—from photosynthesis and renewable energy to geometry and problem solving. This way, Ayala connects the purpose of each visit to the curriculum taught in her classroom.