I had an incredible inspiration for how I wanted to teach English for the second summer course. The owners of the school had bought the vacant lot next door, and it would be just the thing to plant.. All my teaching would be centered around the hands-on growing activities. I was so excited!
We had enough students to divide the class into two. Ages 4-8 were in one class. Ages 9-13 in another class. We offered music, P.E., art, and computer classes as well. I had to make some modifications for the difference in the age groups, but not much.
So we planted. We planted starter seeds in toilet paper tubes. We planted test plants (one with no sun, one with no water, one with too much water, one well cared for) in soda bottles. We planted corn, beans and squash (See also Planting with the three sisters) in the vacant lot. We also planted sunflowers, but they didn’t really grow.
We brought Fiona, our donkey, to till up the lot. My husband, son and I actually came the day before to work the land because the dirt was packed down. The kids didn’t care that they weren’t actually breaking ground. They loved following Fiona around.
Then we planted, watered, weeded, added fertilizer when the plants yellowed and tromped merrily through the mud every other day. On inside days, this was the rainy season, after all, we learned about plant parts, discovered the difference between fruit and vegetables, attended to our indoor seedlings, learned about beneficial insects and the growing process, sang and generally had a good time. When our seedlings were ready, we transplanted them into pots they had made in art class.
The final day of class we invited the parents to see what we had learned. Each child received a sprouting tomato plant to grow in their backyard. Since the corn was not yet ready for harvesting, we invited everyone back in October for a Harvest Festival, which was another smashing success. We played wheelbarrow, rode Fiona, picked and toasted our very own corn, had sack races and enjoyed ourselves immensely.
It may seem strange that this type of activity was so enjoyable to semi-rural Mexican children. It just so happens that this particular group of students were townies, at least, 2 generations removed from the farmers their grandparents were. Moroleon had an industrial boom some time back and now all the adults work in clothing factories, not in the fields. In just one generation, the children had lost their connection to the natural world and oh the joy in rediscovering it!
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