beanstalk, Author at Seed St. Louis

Earth Day at Clay

Posted on April 28, 2015 by beanstalk

We celebrated Earth Day at Clay this week by learning about trees. In the words of one of our students, “Trees help keep the earth clean!”

We learned how to figure out how old a tree is by counting the rings in a stump, and we made leaf rubbings with different types of tree leaves. When I demonstrated how to make a leaf rubbing, all the kids ooohed and aaaahed as the leaf ‘magically’ appeared on the page.

We finished it off by planting a few trees around the garden. It takes a group of kids under 8 a loooong time to dig a hole for a tree– we had to stop and admire every worm.

-Ms. Carolyn, Gateway Greening Educator

A Letter to Gateway Greening from Mallinckrodt Academy

Posted on April 21, 2015 by beanstalk

Gateway Greening…

Mallinckrodt Academy would like to express how happy we are to have a partnership with Gateway Greening. Our outdoor garden space is an extension of the classroom where students and teachers have the opportunity to explore nature through all the four seasons and have a great time doing so.

This school year we’ve started some new initiatives and our outdoor garden space fits in beautifully. We’ve also had a number of environmental activities that work well with our outdoor space. KidsGROW, a Fontbonne University led program, brought in volunteers who created hands-on activities to help students understand the importance of a healthy diet. We have also created an after school garden club were students have an opportunity to learn about several different components of Earth Science. It is also very common to see our students, teachers, and parent volunteers outside enjoying our space.

None of these activities/programs would be possible without our number one fan, parent, and Gateway Greening Educator, Mrs. Punita Patel. She is incredible! She has created a wonderful and positive buzz within our school and has provided tremendous support to our Mallinckrodt team. Gateway Greening has been a wonderful addition to our school community.

-DeAndre Thomas, Principal

My Plate, Our Garden: National Nutrition Month at Gateway Greening

Posted on March 9, 2015 by beanstalk

March is national nutrition month, and this year’s theme is “Bite into a Healthy Lifestyle.” How do Gateway Greening and community gardens support healthy lifestyles? One bite at a time!

The USDA’s My Plate campaign recommends making half our plate fruits and vegetables. Using fruits and vegetables from our gardens to color our plates is one way to ensure that we are packing a nutrient rich punch into every bite. Produce from our gardens is naturally low in sodium, fat, and cholesterol and high in vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Eating local produce not only makes our plates colorful but adds texture and flavor because local produce is seasonal produce—meaning it is picked right at the peak of freshness!

Check out these tips to help you bite into more fruits and vegetables:

‪ Boost your breakfast by adding fruit in your cereal or fresh vegetables to omelets or eggs

‪ Use fresh, crisp vegetables instead of salty olives and pickles on sandwiches and salads

‪ Redefine chips by baking thin slices of sweet potatoes or pieces of kale as a side dish to sandwiches and burgers

‪ Add shredded vegetables such as carrots or zucchini to main dishes such as pasta

‪ Add chopped vegetables such as peppers or mushrooms to main dishes such as tacos and quesadillas

‪ Double the vegetables in recipes such as soups, casseroles and pizzas

Incorporating other plant based foods such as nuts, seeds, and whole grains into your diet can provide an excellent source of healthy fats and fiber, and may help lower the risk of heart disease. Try adding a plant-based food from your garden to each meal this month as we celebrate National Nutrition Month.

Visit the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics’ website, www.eatright.org for more tips on biting into plant based foods. Happy Eating!

-Aspen Mittler, Gateway Greening Fall 2014 Intern

Volunteer Opportunities

Posted on December 19, 2014 by beanstalk

Sweet Potato Festival

What: Come help out at a Sweet Potato Festival!! This is an educational event focused on elementary and middle-school aged youth from the North Campus are. We will be highlighting nutrition, and fall fun activities that relate to sweet potatoes and distributing hundreds of pounds from our bountiful harvest!

When: Saturday, November 15th 10am-2:30pm

Where: North Campus (4449 Red Bud Ave. St. Louis MO 63115)

Current Volunteer Opportunities

Posted on December 19, 2014 by beanstalk

11/19: Sweet Potato Fest

When: Saturday, November 15th 10am-2:30pm

Where: North Campus (4449 Red Bud Ave. St. Louis MO 63115)

How: To volunteer or for more information, contact [email protected]

or (314) 588-9600 ext. 110

Creating New Roots, Harvesting More than Vegetables

Posted on December 2, 2014 by beanstalk

Picture a well-kept garden. Clean walking paths guide you through the flourishing plots of colorful fruits and vegetables growing weed free. This is something you expect from experienced gardeners, right?

Think again! It’s run by Gateway Greening’s City Seeds Program and it’s one of the best urban gardens I’ve ever seen. It doesn’t hurt that there’s a beautiful view of the Arch too! Interning with them this past fall I’ve had the opportunity to set aside the clinical aspect most dietetic interns focus on and create new roots, where I’ve harvested more than vegetables.

The last few weeks at Gateway Greening have been such a great learning experience! Never did I imagine that while completing my dietetic internship I would be planting trees, harvesting vegetables, and turning compost, but I wouldn’t change it for the world! Gateway Greening’s goal is simple: to provide St. Louis with a fun, safe, and educational environment for people to learn… and that’s just the experience I got!

Coming to Gateway Greening with little gardening or agriculture experience, I’m surprised they trusted me with a shovel and shears, but on my first day they had me step right in and get my hands dirty. I truly believe in the Chinese Proverb, “involve me and I’ll understand,” and because Gateway Greening practices this proverb, I was able to green my thumb and create new roots of knowledge for my future career.

We are much more willing to try new foods when we are involved in the process, so using this opportunity to teach job skills and nutrition from the ground up only makes sense. Not everyone has the privilege of knowing the life cycle of a sweet potato or how to plant and harvest squash, so utilizing urban areas to accomplish these goals in my eyes is very beneficial.

Gardens offer opportunities for fun and physical activity while serving as an important educational tool to help others understand how healthy food is produced. It also provides an experiential learning setting, especially one in which we have direct, hands-on experience and can build new knowledge, skills, and values.

While I came in with a nutrition background knowing little about plants and vegetation, I can now say I have a better understanding of sustainable urban gardening and have learned proper gardening techniques that I will last a lifetime. What a fun and meaningful experience!

Megan Haeberlin

Fontbonne University Dietetic Intern

Planting Seeds, Harvesting Experiences: Dietetic Interns at the Farm

Posted on October 15, 2014 by beanstalk

As Fontbonne Dietetic Interns at Gateway Greening we are leaving behind traditional internship rotations and putting on our gloves –gardening gloves— to better understand the effects of sustainable food on a community.

Immersive training is an integral part of becoming a dietitian. But at Gateway Greening we dietetic interns aren’t just getting our feet wet, we are getting outside and getting our hands dirty, and we don’t miss the office.

What do dietitians and urban agriculture have in common? Food, and collaborating in the name of food is something we are always interested in.

Dietitians are focused on helping others become the healthiest version of themselves, beginning with their diet. As dietitians in training we focus a lot on the biochemical and medical nutrition therapy aspects of food. Our time at Gateway Greening helped us look at nutrition from a more personal light. From gardening to creating recipes, we were able to focus on the level of nutrition most people relate to–nutrition from the ground up.

Spending time with the professionals at Gateway Greening also helped us to better understand the solutions available to health barriers in urban settings and how to overcome them as a community. By putting our hands in the dirt and our faces in the sun (or rain) we were able to learn about the importance of having a connection to the food you eat, and how city farmers are working hard to minimize urban hunger while maximizing community partnership.

The result? A new crop of dietitians. Dietitians that not only know how to educate on healthy food choices but ones who understand the roots of healthy food and the hard work that goes into growing them.

It’s not easy being green- but it sure is rewarding. Not only did we learn about sustainable food sources but we now better understand our part in the urban food supply and how to educate others on it—and that’s some serious green power.

Perhaps one of the most valuable lessons we will learn during our time as dietetic interns is that the seeds you plant you eventually harvest. We sure are thankful for the meaningful seeds Gateway Greening helped us plant during our time here. Thanks Gateway Greening for taking on Fontbonne Dietetic Interns and for allowing us to be a small part of your big impact. Now good luck keeping us out of the gardens!

-Aspen Mittler, Fontbonne Dietetic Intern

They Are Like My Babies!

Posted on July 24, 2014 by beanstalk

Hello, my name is Ting Liu. This is my last week as an intern at Gateway Greening. I have spent 2 months here and gained wonderful gardening and teaching experience. In this passionate organization, people do awesome work in the city!

I am part of the Youth Program and responsible for Early Childhood Education. I deliver weekly gardening classes for three day care centers. I’ve done many interesting activities with children and given them many chances to experience their gardens.

My favorite gardening activity is to plant and transplant vegetables with kids. Kids love this hands-on class. They like to touch and smell leaves and they like to dig soil and water plants. We got many interactions through planting. It is a great way to have them communicate with nature, and it helps me understand them better.

Through the 2-month internship, my thoughts regarding gardening changed a lot. I didn’t have an opinion about gardening before. But now, I am interested in having a small and personal garden near my house. I feel excited about plants’ growth. Each time, when I got to day care centers, I couldn’t wait to check the vegetables we planted. When I found they were getting higher and bigger, I got proud of them. They are like my babies!

Introducing Our Summer Youth Staff: Otha Burton

Posted on July 9, 2014 by beanstalk

Hi my name is Otha. I work with Gateway Greening. I play football for Northwest Academy Law High School and I like to work. I love to help people out when they need help and I like knowing how to work in a garden and farm. My favorite part is that the little kids like to plant flowers and dig holes and put the flowers in them, but they don’t like to get dirty.

Goodies From The Garden

Posted on June 24, 2014 by beanstalk

We are already almost half way through our summer break! The spring storms have been good to our gardens at Gateway Greening. We are harvesting beautiful produce and having a great time in the garden. Summer programs are also enjoying planting, watering,harvesting, and other tasks that are necessary to maintain a garden. Claire

At one of our summer sites, we have been busy with a garden that seems like it is getting larger every week and kids who are eager to see the results of their hard work. So far this week, we have tackled some important tasks. Today, we noticed there were a few sweet potato beds that were not growing as healthy as we had hoped. While this usually isn’t ideal, it gave the kids an opportunity to test the soil. This lesson involved teaching the kids what nutrients are in ideal soil and necessary for growing healthy plants. Kids dug up soil samples from the sad beds, added and mixed in water, waited for the soil to settle, and used a soil testing kit to test for nutrient deficiencies. As we were waiting for the results, a group of three ladies were busy picking, chopping, mixing and taste testing. We enjoyed this cloudy mid 70s weather with a bowl of fresh salad from the garden. They used dinosaur kale, cucumbers, carrots, snap peas, green bell peppers, broccoli, and strawberries all from the garden. They added pieces of pineapples, a simple dressing, and a cracker on the side. The three young ladies who put this salad together couldn’t keep their hands off of the ingredients as they were making it. The salad seemed to go over well, and if the kids didn’t like it they picked out the ingredients they did like. The children learned that using the food they were growing is simple and delicious. What are you using your garden goodies for?

The soil was taking longer than we expected to produce results, but hopefully we can come up with a solution for our sweet potato beds soon.

– Claire Hagarty, Youth Program Intern