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Are you interested in helping our students grow through nutrition education and garden-based supplements to learning in all subject matters? Do you believe that a school yard filled with nature adds to the social, emotional, physical, and academic development of our students? Join Murch’s active group of parent volunteers and teachers who develop and maintain our schoolyard living laboratories. On May 15 from 7-9 p.m. the GreenScene will meet at the home of Karen and Tim Abrams to review the projects on deck for the rest of this school year and to plan and budget the 2012-2013 year. If you have a pet project or pet peeve, now is the time to be heard! The following areas are under the GreenScene canopy:

• Murch has a Native Plant and Butterfly Garden where preK and 2nd grade students live what they learn about plant and animal life cycles. All students get to walk the maze and see a mosaic of beautiful native plants abuzz with insect and wild life.
• Murch’s Organic Vegetable Garden provides nutritious snacks for students while nourishing their understanding of where food comes from, plant and insect biology, math, cultural studies, language, and art. For example, our first graders study the Native American folklore and tradition of using companion planting in the Native American Three Sisters Garden. They see how the vastly different growth habits of corn, beans, and squash work together. They learn about the nutrition and uses of these foods — particularly the uses of dent corn in the modern American diet. All of our students get to marvel at the height of the corn stalks, hunt for bugs and beans crawling up the stalks, and hypothesize about whether the pumpkin vines will reach Reno Rd.!
• Murch boasts an incredibly diverse Tree Canopy, now including a native fruit orchard planted by some of our 3rd graders. Ask any Murch student why trees are important and you will be amazed at how much they know!
• The Textile Garden is a beautiful patchwork quilt of plants and flowers used for making cloth, dyes, paints, woven goods, and paper. It is a beautiful and quiet little corner where children go to explore, and where they see some of the natural origins of textile goods.
• Murch’s Herb Container Gardens are a fun exercise in math for our third grade gardeners and in colonial gardening for our fourth graders. The students learn the many uses and varieties of herbs, including herbs as an organic form of pest management for our vegetable garden. In most of our pots the leaves are pinched and tasted by kids before the bugs can get to them!
• Our Eco Center has a water barrel and composters, where students gather water for the gardens in recycled containers and deposit food and plant wastes to make compost to nourish our soil. Both practices help keep the Earth’s water and air a little cleaner. Did you know that plant based materials in our landfills decompose anaerobically and give off methane gas? When we compost those same materials, they decompose aerobically and become healthy, life-giving soil.

Whether you have or want a green thumb, a creative mind, a knack for nutrition, or are a fundraising-grant applying guru, you’ll find a place to volunteer in the GreenScene. Please RSVP for the Wine and Veggies meeting to Lisa Burke.