- Cardozo Senior High School
1200 Clifton St NW
Washington, DC 20009
In the spring of 2002 students and faculty at Cardozo Senior High School installed a Peace Garden in their schoolyard. The Cardozo Peace Garden consists of two main beds, each around 70 feet long and 5 feet wide. The Peace Garden has been integrated into the school’s World Geography curriculum and a Beautification Club has been created to care for and maintain the garden. The school hopes to improve its Peace Garden and continue to integrate the garden into their curriculum. They have considered adding a composting area and outdoor benches to create a better outdoor learning space. For more information, contact George Telzrow at peacegarden02@yahoo.com
- C Melvin Sharpe Health School
4300 13th St NW
Washington, DC 20011
Students and staff at the C Melvin Sharpe Health Schools converted a portion of their schoolyard into “Nature’s Retreat”. They have planted a total of 19 trees, which students in the garden club and science classes help to maintain. Nature’s Retreat is enjoyed by students as a sanctuary and utilized by classes as a setting for journaling or as a place to observe and explore wildlife.
- Draper Elementary School
908 Wahler Place, SE
Washington, DC 20032The Draper Elementary School has a circular memorial garden in their schoolyard, which includes a butterfly garden, an herb garden, a miniature water garden, and two built-in boxes with annuals, perennials and shrubbery. Students designed the gardens as part of art class, learning the elements and principles of design. As parent and staff interest continues to grow, the school hopes to reclaim plant boxes on the south-side of the building and restore a picnic/learning feature on the school grounds. Student support and interest is also growing; the school’s gardening club is expanding and helping to organize the maintenance and upkeep of the gardens.
- Elsie Whitlow Stokes Community Freedom Public Charter School
3220 16th St. NW
Washington, DC 20010
Stokes School first initiated its "Planting Peace" schoolyard beautification project in the fall of 2002 with the goal of creating and maintaining a garden that would serve as an engaging, peaceful space in their schoolyard. Throughout the school year, Stokes School organizes several community activities with this goal in mind. Every Earth Day, the entire school community, including students, parents, and faculty members, comes together to "plant peace". Over the past three years classes have planted window boxes, bulbs, and native bushes, built birdhouses, and hatched and released butterflies in the garden. In 2004 classes fundraised to buy a bench for the peace garden and made a book explaining the various plant and animal life one would see if they sat in the garden. Individual classes also organized specific projects. The third graders planted flowers on September 11 to give back to the earth and remember that day in 2001. The second graders planted a rose bush in memory of a classmate's mother who died of cancer. Every year, the first graders help to keep track of the growing ecosystem in their schoolyard by taking an inventory of the insect wildlife as part of their science unit on bugs. Plans for Earth Day 2005 include, creating a small wildlife habitat, building a bird feeder and bird bath, and making a stepping stone path through the garden where each stone is inscribed with a character trait, like honor, courage, or respect.
- Horace Mann Elementary School
4430 Newark St. NW
Washington, DC 20016
In 2000 Horace Mann Elementary School began a schoolyard greening project, with the goal of incorporating gardens into environmental curriculum in every classroom and bringing students and teachers outdoors. Parents designed six theme beds, which replaced an area of asphalt on the school grounds: a butterfly garden, herb garden, berry garden, sensory garden, cultivating strips in raised beds and a hedgerow. A sixty-foot walled garden of native plants (begun in cold frames) was also constructed in the schoolyard. Teachers have successfully integrated the garden into their curriculum though monitoring the growth of milkweed with 2 nd grade classes studying Monarchs, planting bulbs with 1 st graders involved in a Journey North project, adopting and studying trees with kindergarten classes, and mapping the garden and identifying leaves with students of all ages. The school is currently working to further develop multidisciplinary garden activities and to create a committee of students to manage the garden.
- Janney Elementary School
4130 Albemarle St NW
Washington, DC 20016
Students in after school programs at The Janney Elementary School helped to design and plant a garden in their schoolyard. Students help to maintain the garden by mulching in the spring and enjoy utilizing the space before and after school. Informal curriculum ties have been made to the garden through concepts such as interdependence and conservation. The school hopes to develop a butterfly garden to complement the 2 nd grade classes’ studies of the lifecycles of the painted lady and swallowtail butterflies.
- Maime D. Lee School
100 Gallatin St NE
Washington, DC 20011
At Maime D. Lee School, in NE Washington, teachers use windowsill plantings to demonstrate germination, propagation and care of living things. There have also been efforts to beautify the courtyard and building perimeter and turn it into an outdoor learning space.
- Marie Reed Elementary School
2200 Champlain St NW
Washington, DC 20009
Students and teachers at the Marie Reed Elementary School are involved with a program called GLOBE, in which students plants seeds in science class, care for them and then transplant them into their schoolyard garden. In the spring and fall this area is used to study birds, butterflies, moths and other wildlife that visit the schoolyard. Throughout all seasons, students use the weather station that’s located in their garden. The school hopes to add benches and tables to the existing garden and create an outdoor lab for environmental monitoring and urban ecology studies.
- Mendley Elementary School
425 Chesapeake St SE
Washington, DC 20036
In 1995 significant improvements were made to the schoolyard at Mendley Elementary School. Debris, poisonous vines, and wild plants were removed from the site. In their place, sand boxes were constructed, flowers and grasses were planted and picnic benches were built. Recently students and teachers have taken steps towards building a flower garden by measuring the area and testing soil and water quality in their schoolyard.
- Murch Elementary School
4810 36th St NW
Washington, DC 20008
At Murch Elementary School many classes have taken part in beautification projects on their schoolyard. The second grade class, along with help from many parents, built and maintains as small butterfly garden on the site. The school also holds cleanup days in the spring and fall.
- MV Leckie Elementary School
637 Third St. NE #40
Washington, DC 20002
As a partnership with American Institute of Architects (AIA), students and teachers at the MV Leckie Elementary School designed and built a memorial garden for those lost at the Pentagon on 9/11, during the 2002-2003 school year. The garden is planted with bulbs and perennials and is maintained by school staff. AIA provided teachers with training in architecture, landscape architecture and interior and exterior environments. The school’s long-term vision includes adding trees, benches and mini-gardens to the blacktop play area and creating raised beds for vegetable gardening.
- Myrtilla Miner Elementary School
601 15th St NE
Washington, DC 20002
As a partnership with the National Arboretum, students have participated in indoor and outdoor gardening programs. These programs as closely tied to DC Public Schools’ curriculum standards.
- Stanton Elementary School
2701 Naylor Rd SE
Washington, DC 20020
In 2000 a 60 foot by 40 foot garden for fruits, flowers and vegetables was built at Stanton Elementary School. Students use the garden to observe
growth, study life cycles and measure and compile garden-related data. Their work in the garden is closely related to science curricula being taught in the classroom and is often tied in with lessons on life science, physical science and earth and space science. Students continue to maintain the garden and hope to build a wetland environment as well as butterfly and wildflower gardens in their schoolyard.
- Theodore Roosevelt High School
4301 13th St NW
Washington, DC 20011
Through participation in the Department of Health’s Trees for Kids Project students have planted and maintained eight trees on their school grounds, helping to check erosion on the schoolyard hillside. The school also planned and developed a butterfly garden and a vegetable garden, which have been well-maintained for the past three years. The schoolyard is used frequently for hands-on learning by Lutheran Social Service’s community gardening and habitat stewardship programs, by ESL Science classes and by the school at large. Students’ work in the garden is closely tied to the curricula through concepts such as nutrition, composting, and creating and maintaining a healthy, attractive, ecologically-sound schoolyard environment. Future projects at Theodore Roosevelt High School include a restoration of the school’s greenhouse to provide space for winter outdoor learning and converting a leaky schoolyard fountain into a pond habitat for hands-on science learning.
- Watkins Elementary School
420 12th St SE
Washington, DC 20003The Watkins’ "Living Urban Schoolyard" began ten years ago with a small butterfly garden and has since grown to include 25 theme gardens on the school grounds. Teachers have been very successful integrating the gardens into their curriculum and treating their schoolyard as an outdoor classroom. A teacher training program has been implemented to help teachers use the gardens across the curriculum. Students have helped to design and place stepping stones to make the gardens more accessible and each classroom has taken on the responsibility of maintaining one of the gardens. Teachers and students are currently working towards improving the accessibility of the garden even further and adding benches to make it more suitable as an outdoor learning space.
For more information, contact Barbara Percival at bobperciva@aol.com