Davis Waldorf School- “making sense of our studies” through the garden By Lorie Hammond, Special to the Enterprise
This column continues a series spotlighting school gardens in the Davis Joint Unified School District (DJUSD). These gardens are supported in part by Davis Farm to School (DF2S), a project of the Davis Farmers’ Market Alliance (501c3), and are coordinated by Nate Tauzer, the DJUSD and DF2S Garden and Environmental Coordinator.
On December 7, I had the privilege of attending the Davis Waldorf School’s Family Craft Day 2024. It was a delightful day, when students and their families participated in various student and parent developed crafts projects designed to serve as hand-made, nature-oriented holiday presents. Activities included wreath making, using a great variety of gathered branches, berries, and ribbons; candle dipping; making gnome garden houses from natural materials; fleece angel making; and more. Almost all crafts were made of natural materials gathered by families or students. Rachel Hilbert, Waldorf’s Director of Community Development, explained that rather than have a crafts sale, it fits the Waldorf philosophy for student and families to create holiday presents of natural materials together.
Davis Waldorf School is a school with a clear philosophy, one aspect of which is a deep connection to the natural world. The rambling five-acre campus has small and large gardens everywhere, which children can enter and play in when they have free time. In addition, a half-time garden teacher, Dominique, tends the garden and conducts weekly lessons for students in grades 2-5. Younger students, including preschoolers, also create gardens with the help of their teachers.
As a private school, Davis Waldorf can create its own curriculum. Big subjects covered at each grade level are integrated with garden studies, cooking, and art, “so that it all makes sense”, states Dominique. The Waldorf motto of “head, hands, and hearts” emphasizes not only academics, but students’ ability to work with their hands, through crafts, and an emphasis on the heart through building relationships with oneself, others, and the natural world.
Davis Waldorf School is part of a network which contains 1,200 Waldorf elementary schools and over 2,000 preschools world-wide. One outstanding feature of Waldorf schools is that in addition to classroom teachers, experts in particular subjects are hired to teach these subjects to students. Dominique is one of these specialists. She studied agronomy in her native country, Chile, and then came to Davis where she received a MS Degree in Agricultural Development.
What does a curriculum which integrates gardening in so many ways look like? Here are some examples.
In second grade, Waldorf students are introduced to the garden. They begin by growing “big seeds,” like peas and corn, that are easy to grow. They also do a lot of crafts and cooking projects around the garden, using an outdoor kitchen which is in the garden.
In third grade, students do a major study of farming in their classrooms and in the garden. They learn where their food comes from and experience it by growing wheat, grinding it into flour, and baking bread in the outdoor bread oven in the garden. They also raise chickens from babies, first in the classroom, then in a pen in the garden. When they lay eggs, students gather and cook the eggs to complete the cycle of chicken life.
In fourth grade, students study California native plants and peoples, and the history and geography of California. Garden lessons coordinate with this major study. They gather acorns, turn them into acorn flour and end the year by making acorn pancakes.
In fifth grade, students learn about botany in depth. They learn many ways to propagate plants, including from succulent cuttings. They learn to grow mushrooms by inoculating strawbales with mushroom culture. They also study medicinal plants, propagating them and learning to make teas, salves, lotions, and syrups. Both plants and their products are then shared with the community in a big spring sale. As a culmination, students produce a beautiful journal about medicinal plants which becomes a keepsake.
These garden projects are examples of a school in which the garden is integrated with big themes studied in the classroom, “making it all make sense.” At Davis Waldorf School, the garden is not an extra subject, it is a mainstay which helps to ground thematic work in a pattern which integrates “head, heart and hands.”
Lorie Hammond, PhD, is a Professor Emerita from the College of Education at CSU Sacramento, where she taught science, art and bilingual education and developed urban school gardens with communities of immigrants. She is founder and former director of Peregrine School, a garden-based, experiential learning school in Davis, and has authored the book, Growing Whole Children in the Garden, about seasonal garden education. Lorie is now acting as education advisor for the DF2S program.
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