The Columbus Museum Helps South Columbus Elementary's Eagles Go Green

This spring, The Columbus Museum was invited to participate in South Columbus Elementary’s agricultural education initiative, Eagles Go Green! Over the course of two days, Academic Programs Manager Rachel Vogt and Gallery Teacher Kristin Andris met with K-5th grade students in Alexandra Countryman’s art room to create connections between art and agriculture through a hands-on learning activity. The Museum’s lesson was inspired by Alma Thomas’s 1966 painting, Air View of a Spring Nursey, which is Thomas’s interpretation of what the colorful rows of plants in a nursery would look like from an airplane. During each session, students offered observations and interpretations about the collection object, learned what a nursey was and discussed ways in which their school garden was similar to and different from large scale farming operations, and completed an art activity.

Like Thomas in Air View of a Spring Nursery, students in kindergarten through 2nd grades were asked to imagine their school garden from above. Using brightly colored construction paper and glue, each student designed one row of a class garden. These rows were then connected to create a collaborative garden artwork. Third through 5th graders zoomed in on the garden, taking on the perspective of a pollinator. From bees to bats, students imagined and then drew how objects in their school garden would look through the eyes of these helpful friends. Throughout the lesson, students were encouraged to communicate their thinking by generating ideas about the collection object and to engage creatively with the materials provided. In total, the Museum served 241 K-5th grade students and 21 educators.

South Columbus Elementary (SCE) School was one of two schools in Muscogee County to participate in an agricultural education initiative in partnership with Georgia Organics. According to Dawn Grantham with Georgia Organics and SCE’s assistant principal Victoria Griffin, the school “was selected not only because of its location (in a food desert), its community partnerships, and strong school leadership, but because of its active interest and on-going involvement in growing food on its campus.” The food, which includes lettuce, carrots, and kale grown at SCE, will be harvested and sold at a garden-market fundraiser with the proceeds going to purchase the resources needed to sustain their school garden.