FULLERTON : Young Students Get Taste of Gardening

Shally Torres knows how to take care of a plant.

“Water it and let the sun get to it,” the 7-year-old said proudly this week as she and about 60 other first- and second-graders at Raymond Elementary School planted their new garden.

Shally and a classmate tugged at a honeysuckle to pull it out of its plastic pot and put it in the ground.

“Plants get food from the dirt,” Shally said as she scooped out earth to make room for the plant. She found a small bug and showed it to a friend before tossing it away. “I found a worm,” shouted another girl nearby.

The flowers were planted around the perimeter of a garden between two buildings at the school, where students have also planted onions, radishes, carrots, lima beans, cauliflower and lettuce. The garden is about 1,000 square feet and has a path running down the middle.

The students are learning about plant life in their classes as they study reading, writing, math and social studies. Teachers said lessons on plants are incorporated into each subject.

“We’re all working together as a group,” said second-grade teacher Sharon Gardell as she monitored the students. Immediately after saying that, she had to reprimand a student who was choking one of her classmates. “Hugging is one thing . . . hanging on someone’s neck is another,” Gardell explained to a visitor.

The children got a lot of help with the garden from Sabrina Hall, a parent and volunteer, who dug big holes for the flowers and organized donations of supplies and plants from the city, Fullerton Home Depot and the Loma Vista Nursery. She said the students will be able to do their science programs in the garden, and she hopes to build an arbor at one end of the garden.

Many children had trouble getting the flowers out of their plastic pots.

“You must do it carefully so you don’t ruin the plant,” teacher Kathy DeBie told a child who had gotten the plant out, but none of its soil, leaving it with bare roots hanging. DeBie showed him how to put soil around the plant in the ground.

Some of the children shook the plastic pots upside down to try to get the plants out, which Michael Morgan, a 7-year-old in DeBie’s class, said was his favorite part of the afternoon of planting.

Matthew Singleton, a student in Gardell’s class, agreed that taking the plants out of their pots was the highlight. Matthew, 7, wore a Stussy T-shirt as he helped out by sweeping soil off the sidewalks surrounding the garden. While he swept, the other children sat with their teachers and sang songs about flowers before returning to class.