Composting in The Glenn

By: Erin Tessier

These past weeks in The Glenn we talked about composting. Each classroom has their own compost collector and the kids help add what they’ve collected to big compost bins on a weekly basis. They do such a great job and really enjoy helping. We wanted to tie it all together with a composting lesson to ensure they understand why we compost.

We started off talking about trash, and where trash goes. And then talked about recycling, since our goal is to make less trash, and be less wasteful. Well, composting is nature’s way of recycling =). We can turn our old banana peels, apple cores, and leftover lettuce and veggie/fruit scraps into wonderful soil amendment for the garden. It’s like vitamins for our plants and bonus for you gardeners out there, it’s free!

We discussed what we put in the compost bins, and that nature does most of the work. The kids learned about some of the different compost critters like worms, sow bugs, fungi, and bacteria that help to “eat” our compostables and turn it into that “black gold” that we add to our garden beds. Since we recently talked about pets, we called those compost critters our pets and discussed their needs. They also need water, food, and air to breath, and a nice place to live. It just looks a little different than what you’d maybe provide your cat or dog =).

The kids then helped to set-up a homemade version of a worm bin that anyone can easily make with some tubs from the store and a drill. Here’s a link from an organization I used to work for (Solana Center) that focuses on educating others about sustainable practices, composting included. They have great resources about how to get started composting and DIY instructions too. You can check out their website at www.solanacenter.org.

Lastly, the kids touched and smelled the finished compost they helped to make over these last months. They all got a kick out of the fact they were touching compost critter poo =). Of course, it smells and looks just like soil. They added some of that finished compost to the garden to help our garden grow.

I hope to offer a composting workshop for you adults out there that might be interested in composting at home. Keep an eye out for updates about that in the coming months, or feel free to ask me directly if you have any composting questions!