Edutopia

The Edible School yard

The Edible School Yard is an outdoor classroom that takes the form of a garden. The middle school students under the guidance of their instructors plant, grow, harvest, cook and eat.
The theory behind this is that students can learn by doing. And they can. When they collaborate in their garden they can bring in subject matter from almost all other classes and solidifies what they have learned by making it meaningful. They learn skills that used to be taught in the home such as cooking, team work, communicating, how to build a community and to rely on on another.
Part of me was sad to see this clip as it is such a wonderful idea, but there is little chance I can be apart of it. As an elementary education major I realize standardize testing on basic subject matter takes more focus in schools, than problem solving or learning. If I do inconsiderate a garden in the class room it will most likely be on a small scale in flowerpots indoors. I may be able to do beans, and have the children take them home to cook with their parents. It's important that students know were their food came from. Their world should not end at the store. They need to know that there is more out there, beyond what they see, and that it affects us. It would also be a way to get parents involved.

A Night in the Global Village

This program seeks to give students a more real understanding of poverty. The program separates students into teams and has them stay over night in "third world" conditions. Each team lives like a different country and no team is given every thing they need for the night. In each team one person was "pregnant" and was given an empathy belly and one person was "missing" a hand and hand that hand bandaged to function like a stump. There is also one member that is two years old and one that is an elder.
This set up forced the student to barter, collaborate, and support their fellow team members. It was amazing to see these middle school students reflect on their experience in such an adult way. The whole experience really let them see beyond themselves.
Again I am a little dismayed to see a wonderful program I have little likelihood of being apart of. I can teach about poverty and hunger and implement reading programs on the topic, but nothing will come close to the sort of experience that the Global Village provides.
To promote the same values (team work, communication, empathy) I could set them into classroom teams each with a task that no one has all the tools for. One task could be to build a bridge between two desks, another could be to collect and scavenge certain items, and so on. I would have to set aside a large amount of time for it though.