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Well it’s been two weeks, I’ve showered 7 times total, haven’t received smell complaints, have been vegan other than some cheese that needed finishing, some cookies, chocolate chips, and brownies, oh and some hot sex. The first week I did half of a “day of silence”, this week I did a half-assed day of silence. I used my phone a couple of times, once to ask my roommate who was at the store to get me some chips (organic) and the other to ask a friend if it was a good time to come over to fill up a pitcher with beer (probably not organic) that was left from a kegger two nights prior. Could I have lived without tortilla chips and beer? Maybe. All I know is that I had some chips and some beer and I’m alive now. I can’t confirm that those things weren’t crucial to my survival. I also got on my computer two hours before my 24 hours was up, but that’s only because I had soooo much to blog about that I just couldn’t hold it in. Next week I’ll try to adhere more closely to the tenets of my day of silence, even if it means risking death by lack of fried, salted corn. Organic corn that is.
The other day I went grocery shopping and just splurged on organic produce. I dropped over a hundred bucks. Some of the highlights of my trip were: kale, spinach, shitake mushrooms, grapefruits, avocados, beets, various beans and nuts, peanut butter, salsa, roasted garlic hummus, various frozen fruits, and brown rice protein powder, along with several more plain-Jane items. I opted for organic with most things, unless the option didn’t exist or the price difference was outrageous. For example, organic apples, oranges, grapefruits, and celery are all comparatively priced to their non-organic counterparts, but an organic green bell pepper cost over five times the price of a non-organic one! ($2.69 vs. $0.50). As far as I know almost everything I bought was a product of the U.S. with the exception of organic Mexican avocados and some frozen fruit from Peru, Chile, and Costa Rica. Apparently they don’t grow mangos and pineapples locally. So I didn’t do extremely well as far as locality goes, but for pretty much the first time ever, I didn’t buy bananas since they are usually from Guatemala or even further south. I also bought honey from Hanover, KS. Honey is a controversial topic among vegans since it’s technically an animal product. Some people who call themselves vegans openly eat honey, which they know full well promotes insect slavery. Others who are “veganer than thou” think this is an atrocity. I am not on that level, nor do I ever hope to bee.
On my day of silence, which was a beautiful day, I wanted to go meditate in nature. However, I was busy from the time I woke up until about 7:30 PM with a performance that lasted half an hour. Since I had missed out on all the daylight, I decided to go to the tightest place to hang out after dark, the cemetery. I biked around there for a while. It was very dark, slightly spooky, and brimming with homeless people and high-schoolers cheesing. Okay I made that last part up. I found a comfortable spot near Roy and Eva Kiser, bless their souls, where I could lay down and see some stars and stayed until my feet were uncomfortably cold. It gave me time to recall, digest, and reflect on all the events of the day and previous couple days. It also gave me time to unwind and just think about nothing while watching the stars or closing my eyes. It was a very peaceful and rejuvenating experience. When I returned home, I found myself in a far greater mood than when I had left. I was transformed from stressed out and tired to upbeat and energetic. I would highly recommend it! I went back the next day to explore the trails at the far end of the cemetery, very cool area. Totally chill.
Ttyl.
Peace
Yo what up blogosphere? I’m Juergen, and this is How to Be Eco-Tight.
You might be wondering about the title of this blog, or why I sound like a tool so far. It’s modified from a hilarious but inappropriate series of videos in which the main character is the epitome of douchbag . (don’t watch if you’re easily offended)
In my month of walking the talk, I will strive to become the epitome of eco-friendly, without being an eco-douch.
My plan is:
- I will not buy any products other than food, beverages, and medicine.
- I will meditate with nature.
- I will partake in a weekly day of silence where I don’t use a computer, cell phone, TV, or music player.
- I will I will try to use the library or engineering building for doing homework since their lights and computers are already on.
- I will decrease my showering.
- I will only flush for number 2s.
- I will buy as much food as I can from the farmer’s market (if it opens during this project).
- I will look at my food to see where it comes from and try to minimize my food miles.
- I will eat more organic whole foods and food with minimal packaging.
- I will only drive when absolutely necessary and try to carpool and/or do several errands at once when I do.
- I’m basically vegetarian right now, but I will completely cut out all dairy and eggs on top of not eating meat (as soon as I use up the milk and cheese in my fridge).
I started the project a couple days ago, but I’m a huge procrastinator so I’m just now getting my first post up. In my first week, I will meditate in nature once, do a half day of silence and take four showers throughout the week. Next week, I’ll meditate in nature twice, do a full day of silence, and only shower three times. In the remaining two weeks, I’ll increase my nature meditations by one each week and decrease my showers by one each week but never do more than one day of silence per week. As I go along I’ll try to think of more ways to be green. Let me know if you have suggestions!
That’s the end of the post, chill.
I loved this project. I hated this project. It was such a developmental, uplifting and rough time for me. I had to learn not only about sustainbility in eating but also sustainability in keeping myself accountable for the things I do in my life.
For instance, I told alot of people at my presentation today that I re-conceptualized my body as a battle ground, as a cite of protest and a starting point for sustainability. Before this project, when I thought about people hurting the environment with their actions I thought about people littering, not recycling. Now I know that eating, the very act of consuming is in itself a choice to be environmentally stable-or not. Reducing your carbon footprint is as easy as reducing the amount of meat you eat. This doesn’t mean you have to be a hardcore (hXc) vegan or even a vegetarian 100% of the time (although I think it’s completely awesome when people choose those paths.) It means you choose a meat-free dish once a day. Or you only eat meat three out of the four days a week. These efforts alone can cut your carbon footprint by 25%, reducing several tons of C02 the average American would usually eat.
Vegetarianism was easy, veganism was more difficult, and local produce was nigh impossible for me, mostly because of travel and scheduling that week before spring produce was available. And although nature.org thinks that vegans produce 72% less carbon that meat eaters, I learned that the statistic might be flawed. For instance, vegans might rely on tofu, or tempeh, or veggie burgers for their main sources of protein. These have nearly as high a carbon footprint than does anything else–they require process, packaging, shipping, refrigeration, and are sent from a location to a central warehouse and then to your local supermarket. The simple fact might be that if you’re only concerned about meat eating and C02 emissions, eating locally grown meat is the better and more sustainable choice. But as we pointed out–there are a multitude of reasons for eating or not eating meat. Some people cannot stand the cruelty done to animals. some people are worried about health. it’s all about balancing and making choice.
Those choices, however are important. To restate some statistics from an early blog post–there’s a lot at stake. 1/3 of C02 emissions comes from the food industry. 91 percent comes from methane and carbon production in farm management–this is largely factory farms and CAFOs. So yes, even eating vegetarian food cannot escape this statistic. However I am more aware of my body and my environment and how they interact with each other. I have gained a new sort of spirituality that helps me realize just how much control I have over myself and how I treat the world around me. I eat less meat, and sort of just see the world differently. It’s like a new lens in life. And I’m supremely grateful for this project and the new beginnings it’s provided me.
I have now presented my poster to the class about my window farm. Thanks to everyone that stopped by to learn about window farming. Showing my window farm to people gives me an opportunity to educate others about creative gardening and producing/buying local organic food.
I was asked many times today about what I was going to do with window garden now that the class project is over. My garden will live on so do not worry. My window farm will be moving with me to a Boy Scout summer camp that I run. There it will hang in a window in the dinning hall. With this prime location I will have around 1500 people walk by it during the summer and I am sure that many of them will stop to take a look.
The possibility of having 1500 people learn about local food is an exciting idea that I cannot turn down. Exceptionally sense most of that 1500 will be middle school kids. Teaching kids at a young age is the easiest way to make meaning life changes.
And after camp the garden is moving with me to Chicago where I hope to expand it.
I hope that many of you are think about making your own window garden, and if you do please let me know. Here are a few things that I have learned from making my own can could help you.
First, herbs are the best to plant in a window garden because many of them do not grow to big. This style of gardening is not good for large plants. Also herbs allow you to continually harvest them without completely killing the plant.
Second, do forget to water them. The bottles themselves are not very big and with that they cannot store a lot of water. I have to water my garden every two days or it will quickly dry out. I learned this the hard way and my lettuce has not fully recovered from it yet.
Last, come up with a design of your own. You could simply build one close to mine or you could be creative. Being creative with your garden makes this project such a fun to do. A good friend of mine is now making one out of old sections of plastic plumbing of different sizes. Some of the pipes even have right angles in them so he can be even more creative with the design. He is planting wild flowers in his.
Over all this has been a fantastic project. I have truly enjoyed designing and building my garden and learning about environmental issues at the same time in class.
I don’t know diddly squat about art….in technical terms. I fancy the way it looks, and I love the way it makes me feel. It challenges me to do more than think, but to project who I am off of the piece that I’m observing. Everything you observe has a piece of you in it because you are experiencing it. Who cares what the artist(s) was thinking, what am I thinking? How do I feel? Can I catch my breath or do I just want to run away? Can I force myself to stay or am I weeping because its too much for my soul to handle in one take? ….somethings are so beautiful its hard to bear.
So, when did this become about art? As soon as I decided to build something, I just didn’t know how entranced I would become with making things or how involved I would get with my trash. I share an intimate relationship with the products I use, I’m not talking sex toys, but with the things I throw away and with the things I purchase. Now, everything I spend money on (or acquire for free) has a story, has a journey and a destiny and I become the gatekeeper to its fate. Yes, just like in ghostbusters. The product is the key and I’m the person that makes the decisions on which door its going through. On one end, it goes to the trash and ultimately ends up in a landfill. On another end, I throw some glue on the bottom and build something kooky while listening to Peaches…and then its going to be raunchy out the wazoo. On ANOTHER end, I reuse it in another way, incorporate it into my everyday life and deter away from buying something shiny that will break and need to be replaced (just like its supposed to). OR I do something else with it, whatever comes to mind, but as long as I’m not selecting the first option without considering all other options I feel peachy keen.
This project was my attempt to demonstrate how recycling should be the last choice. We must first REDUSE, then REUSE, and as a last resort RECYCLE. With that being said, being conscious of our purchasing and wasting habits is crucial. Secondly, we must be aware that there are OPTIONS! Remember, one woman’s trash is another woman’s treasure. We have the option to change, adapt and alter the things we use and turn them into something that is new. In the same light as recycling combined with reusing, we have the option to create and make art. This kind of art is unconventional, its raw and unyielding…just the way I like it. This kind of art has the potential to make you a more conscious person all around and can ultimately change your world, like it did mine. I’ve found a new solace through this experience and I couldn’t be more appreciative.
In addition to transforming yourself, art, especially eco-art can make a statement and can also help people in many different ways. Viewing art is nice, but its docile. Healing can come from participation and what better way to engage in participation, than to show your work and to work with others.
Art can change things, and its definitely not just for the elite….oh and there are multiple truths in my opinion. essentialism can suck it. check out this article: http://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/28/arts/does-art-change-things-or-people.html
ART IS THERAPEUTIC! You bet your sweet ass it is, check it: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1506781/A-brush-with-art-helps-people-cope-with-the-pain-and-anxiety-of-cancer-says-study.html
In reference to the second article, art can heal. It can help people and in my attempts, it can help the planet. It can be complex, simple, structured or falling apart, the point is that it can be whatever you want it to be. Aside from music, I’m hard pressed to find many other things out there that have the same repertoire.
I loved this project and I’m excited to showcase my work later today. Peace, Love and Captain Planet for life. Chyeah!
…and by that I mean why is there a much higher level of convenience in finding processed foods that have traveled hundred and hundreds of miles instead of locating the local produce, grown within 50 miles?
and why do my tastebuds reject that which it knows is best for them?
I wondered these things as I drove the 10 hours down to see my boyfriend in Waco, TX. Traveling and eating fresh produce is difficult enough, traveling and eating fresh local produce is ridiculously difficult. My local food diet was in shambles eating m&ms, pretzels and whatever food I could find on the road. When I ate a burger it wasn’t native buffalo, the cheese wasn’t fresh made in a creamery down the road. It was produced somewhere foreign, shipped to a distribution center, shipped around the country, and somehow it made itself into my hand, driving 70 miles an hour down I-70. It’s also difficult to find out what plants grow natively and how to find them in different states.
Originally, the game plan was to eat organic only for my final week. However, further research showed that organic certification didn’t mean that the plants were local, and organic plants (while not processed) may still have the same economic footprint as non-processed foods. Next came eating local produce. I figured that local produce would have a lower carbon footprint, for the transportation section alone. Readers, I did not fair very well. Call Hall provided some on-campus locality, but coldness, Kansas, and a picky eater do not bode well together when trying to only eat locally. And, I love me some Panda orange chicken from the Union.
However, I have learned from this project that there is local produce available to me. There are even local diary and meat products. I feel fortunate to live in the breadbasket of America, I am still to this day working on appreciating the delicous splendor of my local land.
When I started this project I never realized how much I would re-learn. When I mean re-learn I just realize just a couple of days ago that I actually had forgotten some things I used to do before I came to college and somehow I lost along the way. Then re-learn because I had to learn how to brush my teeth and turning of the water, or take shorter showers. This also helped me spread the word to other people such as friends and family regarding what I was going and why I was doing it. I also think that just because the project is over does not mean I will stop and go back to my old ways. At least I want to believe and try that I will continue to be cautious regarding my usage as well knowing that I can live without eating meat 2-4 days out of a week, plus greens are good!
As far as the ovo-lacto vegetarian goes, I am please to say that it brought me back to what I used to do before I got to college. What I mean is that before college, I would not eat so many process foods or even can foods, i would normally eat fresh food. When I say fresh not always organic but not canned. I would also not eat out as much if I did it would be on the weekends on Sundays as a treat and only 1 meal. How did being an ovo-lacto vegetarian help me do that? Well to start of I wanted to eat healthier than what I had been, and I knew that most of the foods I had were meat related microwaveable meals. Excuse was no time to cook, or too tired to cook. As well as the cheap the better since I am poor. So when meat was cut off from my diet 3 days out of the week I had to re-invent my meals. I found it a bit hard to find microwaveable meals that did not contain meat, or in other words that were fresh and healthy. So I actually had plan my meals, and most of the recipes where ones I learn from home and they all require fresh ingredients, even if some people substitute it with other non fresh ingredients. That forced me in a way to buy only what I needed for that particular dish and probably 10 time healthier than a Banquet TV dinner plus I had left overs!
As far as dinero ($) having a plan of my week meals helped me not to buy out of the list items like chips, juice, cookies and well junk food saving me money! plus having left overs helps because I would not always have to cook the next day unless I wanted something different then I would just save the left overs for another day.
Another perk is that I have lost some weight, and that’s because I actually get full with a meal instead of having to eat 2 TV dinners. I also feel healthier even if I have been getting sick lately… I think is for the lack of sleep not nutrients though… but Its the end of the semester and I am always sick toward the end… but over all I have also worked out, and when I walk I don’t feel like I am about to die! So Woohoo!! Plus when I don’t buy my TV dinner is less cardboard
Water usage… I have cut down a lot of my water usage, my showers have been cut down to 12 minutes and if i’m not too dirty 9! If I don’t shave then 5 minutes. Over all m usage of water has lowererd and I’m happy for that. I no longer wash my dishes by hand since my roommate prefferse to do it plus according to this article a dishwasher is better than hand-washing: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/08/dishwasher_vs_h.php
Electricity usage: This last bill was $65.52! so if you remember from $138.65 to $81.03 and now to $65.52 15.51 was saved from the last bill to this new one. Over all savings have been $73.13 so I think that says pretty much everything. I won’t deny it’s been hard at times, because unplugging everything can be frustrating in the beginning but after a while its just part of your daily routine.
Recycling: I never thought that most of our trash was made up of cardboard, paper, and plastic. As I mention before before we took out 4 trash bags of more if we had extra people over, but now since we recycle we only take out 1 trash bag a week or 2 if other people are over, or my roommate eats out then we have extra trash… Eating out and having left overs make a lot of trash… never thought about it before but they just take so much room… and most of the containers can’t really be recycled… but over all thanks to recycling our trash has been cut down more than 50%. This I should have known because I used to do this all the time in California, but when I moved to KS in 2002 somehow it just diapered… or in other words its easier to be lazy and just do one movement instead of two… that should not be so!
Over all this project made me happy, it made me realized what I was missing and it makes me crave healthy food! I will be going to the farmers makerket this saturday!! I can’t wait I love food, and when its fresh and good for you even more!
I have to give thanks to Dr. Carroll for giving us this opportunity because I believe we all learned so much not only new information but we learn new things about ourself, and I know we will all take something with us from this projects. I am not looking forward to having my own garden of fruits and vegis, and just eating more healthy and in hopes that some people might also get motivated to be more green and diminish their foot print on earth.
Also Fox has some good ideas that we can all try, please take a look:
Also if you are intresting in doing something good this can help you start that project:
http://www.dosomething.org/dosomething101/home
Also you can enter to win the Green home from HGTV, the car you can sell since its an SUV. But how cool is it to have such a green home, and be close to shops and all you need in walking distance! At least thats what they said.
http://www.hgtv.com/hgtv-green-home-2010-giveaway-enter/package/index.html
P.S
As I said this is the end to a new beginning! I hope its the same to all of you. 
Here is my presentation board.
It pretty much has the information that is provided here in my blog, just more colorful:
My last post I talked about how unrealistic this project is when it comes to providing food. It is impossible to grow enough food from so few bottles and the amount it would take is huge. Some people did not like this idea that I was claiming that this was not realistic. I would like to clear up a few things.
While the amount of food this system can grow is very little it has allowed me to educate others on the idea of local food. Just before the start of this class I was learning for myself about the importance of local food but did not have a way to share it. This project has allowed me to educate others about this movement will showing them my project. The real value of this project is the education and not in production.
On another note Window Farms have showed up on Weekend Edition on National Public Radio a few weeks ago. I have posted the link to the story at the bottom of this post. A key thing that they talk about in this story is how much fun it is to build and take care of a window farm. In my opinion this plays as equally important role as education. If it were not fun then no one would take the time to build one.
While trying to find out exactly how much this project helps the environment I have came across a bigger idea. I want to know how many trees I would have to plant in order to cancel out my carbon footprint. This way I can sleep at night knowing that I am not making things worst. Worst as in green house gases. I am going to look into this and will blog about what I have found soon.
Hello everyone!
Sorry for the late post, my computer got the Blue Screen of death and been without a computer… I am curretly in Hale.
Okay last blog I mention that this blog would be conduction of money and how much I have actually been able to reduce my usage in electricity, water.
Electricity
Well I will start with my Electric (Westar Energy): Before I started this project our Electric bill was $138.65 our latest bill turn out to be, $81.03 We saved 57.62 , I am expecting the next bill to be even less. All it took was some extra blankets, unplugging any electrical devices not being used, and making sure the lights were turn off. I mean think with that 88.45 you can do a lot with! When my roommate and I SAW the big difference we were stoked! It might have been hard at first, but in the end it was totally worth it.
Water
Water: We don’t pay for water at our apartment, but I found this awesome tool, that is a calculator on how much water you use. I have the initial water usage and the final water usage with mostly my usage, and some information about my roommate water usage.
First Results: As you can tell, they are horrible, I was shocked to see that… Also if you are intrested in figuring out how much water you use, here is the link:
http://www.tampagov.net/dept_water/information_resources/Saving_water/Water_use_calculator.asp
As you can tell there is a big change in my water usage. It is sad how much water I still use, but have done a lot better then when I first started. I will like to invite you to use the calculate, and see how much water you use! Its unbelievable, and to think that there is people that don’t have water, while I waste a lot of it…
Recycling/Trash
As far as my recycling I have counted how many times we took out the trash before I started to do this. Now keep in mind that I was only able to recycle for a whole week, meaning separating bottles, cans, cardboard etec. for one week, since my roommate was not too happy to have that around the house.
Before not doing any type of recycling we took out the trash 4 times in 7 days.
When I started separating the cardboard it made it to 3 times
the whole week while I recycle all that was possible, 1 time.
As of now we are only recycling cardboard items and since I am trying to get things that are not package in a box our trash is now 2 times in 7 days (that includes the bathroom trash as well)
So in other words we started by taking the trash 4 times in 7 days to now 2 times in 7 days, so half our waste are recyclable!
Here is a “Trash Trivia Game” even if it says its for 4-6 grade, I think some of the questions most of us don’t know the answers to! try it out!
http://cwmi.css.cornell.edu/TrashGoesToSchool/Trash.html
Food!
Well when I started this project I bought the cheapest things I could get for my money, so normally I would buy food for 2 weeks that would bring me to 60-76 dollars, that would include microwave oven ready foods, Ramen, chips, juice, ham, bread, box dinners were you just add the meat, Beef (steak, ground beef, chicken you name it).
After the project i bought food for only a week, had meals plan, and it cost me 50-57 dollars: it consisted of lentils, cheese, milk, tortillas, eggs, vegetables such as cilantro, onion, peppers, lettuce, fruits, tomatoes, strawberries, mango’s, apples, pears, and grapes as well as more. I would still buy some of the frozen pizzas (have a week spot for them) and cereal but overall I felt I would get more full in one sitting instead of having to keep munching when I did the TV dinners. Plus I also had leftovers that helped a lot when I had no time to cook. I have not lost any weight but Its good to cook again! I won’t deny that sometimes I am too tired to cook, but for the most part I love to cook and I had started to forget about it. One could say that I may have not save much money, but I think other wise, I had more leftover food, and I actually got full with just one plate instead of having to munch on something else since most TV dinners did not conquer my appetite! Also if you plan your meals ahead it helps too!
Here is an article that talks about junk food as an addiction that maybe causing obesity:
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE62R23O20100328
Hope this helps!
Hope to write my final blog this Friday!
Thanks for reading 
WATER USAGE
| RESULTS | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| PER CAPITA DAILY WATER USE IN YOUR HOUSEHOLD (gallons) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| INDOOR WATER USE | OUTDOOR WATER USE | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Bathroom | 30 | Lawn Watering | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Toilets | 20 | Other Outdoor Uses | 0 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Faucets | 180 | GENERAL WATER USE | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Laundry | 1 | <!—-> | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Dishwasher | 1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Hand Washing Dishes | 27 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Click one of the categories above to learn how to reduce your water usage.
New and improve calculations of water reduction.
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–>In Overland Park, Kansas an edible schoolyard began almost 2 years ago at the Hiersteiner Child Development Center. This center is associated with Johnson County Community College and the college advocated for the edible schoolyard. JCCC was given $21,218 from the Sunflower Foundation and another $13,000 from a private donor. The Sunflower Foundation works to improve the health for all Kansans. Unfortunately I could not find much about this center, it is a daycare, not a school and I believe it serves the children of JCCC students and well as JCCC employees. I’ll have to do some more digging and hopefully find more edible schoolyards in this area.
Check out a video about the Hiersteiner Child Development Center’s edible schoolyard HERE
This is one thing I didn’t really think about for this project. I do need to do more research about finding out if this is possible for public schools and where to get the money to start a program like this. If the state is willing to fund it that could be a big way to get schools involved. Many if not all of the public schools are facing budget cuts and would welcome funding. This funding could go towards those who would be teaching about the garden and helping in it, so additional funding could save teaching jobs.
Since we are not in California and produce does not grow year round there needs to be other activities for students while there is no planting, cooking, harvesting, preserving, etc going on. A few of my ideas include researching fruits and vegetables that students have an interest in growing. The older students can become the overseers of each of these crops and teach others how to take care of them . Also students of all ages can learn about the benefits of eating local and organic. They can research global environmental issues, as well all know that in the future and now this information will be vital. In the late summer and fall upper level students can be taught how to preserve fruits and vegetables so they can be eaten year round. And with this preserved food they can learn to cook with these local, organic ingredients and learn about healthy eating. As a video I posted on a previous blog said, this generation of kids are expect to live a shorter life than their parents. They are expected to die of heart related diseases as well as diabetes.
I have all these good ideas, at least I think they are good. I feel that is what I am good at. I can come up with great plans and ideas but I have a hard time being able to implement them. For that I must turn to those in the community where I want to propose this edible schoolyard. Lucky for me, one of those people include my oldest sister. She is a outspoken voice in the community. So my goal over Spring Break is to talk to some of these people and see how they feel about this project and see what they may want to bring to the table. In the case of the first edible schoolyard in Berkeley, they had many community volunteers that helped make their garden a success.
Does anyone have any other suggestions of what to do during the off season in schools while nothing needs to be done outside?? All ideas welcome
