After a busy winter of grant writing, we have been awarded a number of grants with a total of about $31,000!  A huge thank you to the Ivy Tech Foundation's Circle of Ivy, the George E Archer Foundation, and the anonymous component fund of the Community Foundation of Bloomington and Monroe County who granted us this money! This money allowed us to complete the two remaining rooms of our garden, modify the front entrance of our space (making it safer and adding a bike rack!), purchase a display case for signs, purchase a beehive, and do lots of programming for our students, K12 partners, and the public.  

In 2022, in honor of the beehive, we teamed up with campus partners to celebrate BuzzFest 2022 - a yearlong celebration of bees!  Ivy Tech's Center for LifeLong Learning offered a backyard beekeeping program, as well as other programming throughout the year.  Our Hospitality program offered honey themed cooking classes, and our Fine Arts program partnered with German Bee Artist Barbel Rothhaar for a bee themed art installation (click for more info on that project)!  Of course, the Outdoor Learning Lab itself offered programming as well!

On May 10, 2022, the Outdoor Learning Lab hosted its first field trip - almost 60 first graders from Grandview Elementary School.  Students visited five stations to learn about plants and seeds:

Station 1: Students learned the parts of a seed and made and labelled a replica of a seed

Station 2: Students learned how seeds move, looked at seeds up close through a microscope, and recorded their observations like a scientist

Station 3: Students planted seeds to take home as well as planted seeds that, once grown, will be planted in the Outdoor Learning Lab

Station 4: Students learned about the parts of a plant and cut and pasted a diagram of a plant

Station 5: Students planted and mulched marigolds in the Outdoor Learning Lab's The Floor is Lava garden path

The students helped with some weeding, then Grandview finished their visit with a lunch picnic.  What a great time!

In November 2022, a new group of around 66 Grandview Elementary School first graders came to visit.  Although it was too cold for us to spend the entire visit in the Outdoor Learning Lab, we did take a walk on our newly installed hiking trail!

The first graders learned about the animals that would live in the garden through stories and crafts.  The embedded links will take you to instructions to some of the activities we did in case you want to try them at home.  All the books we read are available in the Monroe County Public Library.  After making a paper bag book using 3 lunch bags and a chenille stem, our visitors learned about:

Birds: We read Do you know about birds? by Buffy Silverman, then stamped our fingerprints and add bird features

Spiders: We read parts of Grow with me Spider  by Valerie Bodden then made climbing spiders.

Bees: We read Buzzing Bees by Melissa Higgins then made bee launchers (adapted from this rocket launcher activity, using yellow straws, black duct tape to make stripes, and adding wings tulle wings instead of rocket fins!)

Deer: We read The Secret Fawn Kallie George and Elly MacKay, discussed the playful fawn that lived in the Outdoor Learning Lab in the summer of 2022, then made a deer craft (with a brown nose).

New fun features this summer

Programs

Expanding the Garden

This summer we installed both the middle garden room, which is the Children's Experiential Garden, and the last garden room, which is the wildlife garden room.

Updating the entrance

C&H Lawn and Landscaping did an amazing job changing our entrance from a steep hill to stairs, making it safe and more accessible!

Trail Installation

We installed the first trail in our trail system.  It is about 1/3 of a mile long.