Sun, Jun. 13, 2004

Gardening project helps kids get to the root of their food

Youngsters got their hands dirty at a Melrose Park learning center.

By Cynthia J. McGroarty
Inquirer Suburban Staff

Children at the Mary Bert Gutman Early Learning Center didn't give a fig about the history under their feet last week as they planted zinnias in the footprint of an old hothouse where former Reading Railroad president Theodore Voorhees once grew carnations, roses and orchids.

But they did grow quite concerned about the icky little bug crawling around in a flower bed.

"Eeww," several of them said in unison as they huddled over the freshly composted earth, curious but keeping their distance. "A bug."

"What kind of bug is it?" inquired Helen Victor Turk, director at the learning center, who was sitting nearby.

"A beetle," one of them replied. "A spider," said another.

After the creature's identity was determined, it was agreed that this spider would live to see another day. Spiders, Turk reminded them, are good for the garden because they eat other insect pests.

And so went one of the intended lessons of a garden project that was started four years ago and finally completed on a recent sunny morning at the learning center on the Mandell Educational Campus in Melrose Park.

By digging and planting a variety of flowers and vegetables, the children - 3-, 4- and 5-year-olds - would learn about the natural world, Turk said.
And they would understand that "their food doesn't come from a supermarket," she said. "It comes from the earth."

The project began as a community-gardening endeavor. Congregants from Beth Shalom synagogue cleared brush and weeds from the footprint of the old hothouse, intending to install flower and vegetable beds, said Brad Baker, a design and landscape consultant who built the garden.

Baker owns and operates a landscape design firm, Baker Creative Inc., in Wyncote.
The beds were never completed, though, and the area lay fallow, Baker said. This year, the garden took root.

Baker and his wife, Dina, designed the garden for ease of care, they said. Watering, for instance, had to be convenient, so they ran a hose underground from a faucet about 50 feet away over to the garden.

The hose can be used to fill lengths of eight-inch PVC pipes that support the beds and provide sitting space for the children, Brad Baker said.

Bilge pumps - the kind used on boats - pump water out of the pipes as needed. The water in the insulated pipes will never get hotter than the air temperature and so will not overheat and burn little hands, Dina Baker said. The round, smooth pipes will eliminate dangers from hard edges and splinters, she said.

The Bakers donated time, materials and plants to the project. "My gift to the community," Brad said.

Their plant selections included tomatoes, peppers, beans, cucumbers, basil, thyme, parsley, chive, celosia, zinnia, cosmos, nasturtium, marigolds and snapdragons. They brought bags of fresh beans and cherry tomatoes to the planting last week to show the children what they could expect to harvest.

After a short lesson about how plants grow, the children began digging. Sarah Turk Karan and Olivia Tuzel plunged a small pink zinnia into a bed and patted the earth around it.

"Press it all around," Helen Victor Turk, Sarah's grandmother, reminded them.

The need for sun and the peril of weeds were a few of the garden facts that Harrison Weiss had already learned before setting to work with Brad Baker.

"Weeds take the water from the plants and keep it for themselves," Harrison said.
Once harvested, the vegetables and flowers will be sold to raise money for charity, Turk said. It will be a mitzvah, a good deed that is part of Jewish tradition, she said.
"It's important that these kids give something away. They get a lot," Turk said, adding that tradition also emphasizes caring for the earth.

In turn, the children will benefit from "a gardening experience," Baker said.

"This will bring them in touch with nature. And it's a wonderful, soothing experience," he said.

Back to Now Blooming