Organic Gardens and Mara Māori Create Opportunities For Children's Learning

by Janet Davies, Massey University College of Education, Wellington

[This report is reprinted, with permission, from Organic NZ September/October 2002, pp 40, 41, 50. It includes examples of how the project is operating in two schools: Greenhithe School and Paeroa Christian School]

A pilot programme of professional development to support student learning through the creation and maintenance of organic and Māori gardens began in February this year.

The programme involves urban schools in Auckland, Hawke's Bay, Wellington, and Christchurch, and kura throughout New Zealand. This professional development is funded by the Ministry of Education and organised jointly by the Soil & Health Association of New Zealand, Kids' Edible Gardens, Massey University, and the Auckland College of Education. Additional funding from the recent Budget means development plans can proceed in the current financial year.

Early in May, representatives from 14 participating primary and intermediate schools, seven kura, one wharekura, and one kohanga reo met with programme providers and 10 facilitators at a national hui at Te Kupenga o Matauranga marae at Massey University College of Education in Palmerston North. Facilitators with expertise in education, organic gardening, Māori education and Māori gardening, worked alongside representatives at the hui, and later in schools and kura, to build on existing curriculum.

High on the hui agenda was the development of organic and Māori gardening practice. Traditionally, Māori gardens are organic and so the descriptor is unnecessary. But Māori gardens need to be distinguished from other organic gardens as their practice, principles, and underpinning philosophy is quite distinct. Massey University's Institute of Natural Resources worked with Soil & Health and Kids' Edible Gardens to support the development of gardening practice.

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Good gardening practice, however, is not enough to ensure that garden-related learning experiences are integrated into the curriculum. So a parallel focus was to develop appropriate classroom pedagogy, including approaches to learning and curriculum design. Organic and Māori gardens will only be sustainable if teachers undertake responsibility for the gardens and if learning experiences enable students to meet New Zealand curriculum objectives.

Following the hui, the representatives, mostly classroom teachers, involved colleagues and the wider school or kura community, in developing curriculum. They also began to establish networks and partnerships with the local community. Tangata whenua and local agencies such as the Department of Conservation, Forest and Bird Society, Envirofunz and the Regional Council were invited to participate. Students are involved at all stages of curriculum planning. Their ideas are valued and contribute to collaborative decision-making about the nature of learning experiences and siting, building and maintaining the garden.

The main purpose of the garden in this programme is to provide opportunities for student learning in, about, and for the environment. These are the "dimensions" of Education for Sustainability identified in the Guidelines for Education for Sustainability in New Zealand Schools (Ministry of Education, 1999). The "aims" of Education for Sustainability are to develop student awareness and sensitivity to the environment, knowledge and understanding of the environment, attitudes and values that reflect concern for the environment, and the skills and responsibility to act in addressing environmental issues. Clearly organic gardens can provide experience of all three dimensions and opportunities to achieve all the aims.

Environmental issues do not respect the traditional fragmentation of education into separate learning areas. Thus Education for Sustainability must be cross-curricular, which places additional demands on teachers who have to come to grips with new content in this area of organic growing. The Guidelines help teachers identify and draw together learning objectives from the existing national curriculum statements to ensure learning experiences meet the aims of environmental education.

Participating schools and kura have related many environmental issues to their organic growing. One is the management of food waste left after break and lunch times. Worm farms allow this waste to be recycled through the garden.

Learning experiences in one school met a variety of achievement objectives, including: developing understanding, through the social studies curriculum, of how people's activities change the environment and how people adapt and change in response; developing problem-solving capability, through the biotechnology and structures and mechanisms areas of the technology curriculum; developing understanding, through the science curriculum, of how worms grow and reproduce.

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Curriculum planning in the schools uses the English-medium national curriculum statements and the Māori-medium statements in the kura. These are not only written in Māori, but are based in a Māori world view and thus are often structured quite differently from the English-medium statements. The statements most relevant to curriculum planning for sustainable organic gardens are those for science/putaiao, technology/hangarau, social studies/tikanga-a-iwi, and health and physical education/hauora.

Education personnel from Massey University and Auckland Colleges of Education provide support in all these learning areas, with personnel from Massey's Department of Māori and Multicultural Education supporting Māori-medium curriculum development.

The schools and kura are all at very different stages of development, a few already have a vegetable garden and are planning to develop other gardens, but most are in the early stages of developing an overall scheme for introducing learning associated with organic growing. The scheme may not involve students at all levels nor all students at any one level. More important is its appropriateness to the particular student community and its sustainability within the school or kura organisation.

With funding for the current year, it is planned to involve further schools and kura, especially at secondary level, but the aim is to enhance the depth, rather than breadth, of professional development in this new area. The priority of "sustainable" gardens in schools and kura is continued student learning in organic and Māori gardening once the professional development programme is completed.

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