Earth Week is coming up later this month (April 17 – 25) and some students at Fishburn Elementary School in Roanoke are getting a head start on the celebration. The students in preschool through fifth grade have produced art which is on display through Friday, April 9 at the Virginia Western Community College’s Art Gallery.
The project is a collaborative effort between the elementary school and the university. Sue Steele Thomas, Associate Professor of Art and Director of the art gallery, says she wanted to get the community more involved. “We want people to come to the gallery. We want them to know it’s always open to them.” And since Fishburn Elementary is just across the street, Thomas says, “it seemed a natural fit.”
School officials decided to do an environmental art display with the theme “We Care.” “It’s been an incredible pleasure to work with them and to see this art,” says Thomas. “I was amazed at seeing the interpretation of what they [the students] decided was important about the environment.”
The walls are covered with drawings of trees and birds, a few turtles (Fishburn’s mascot), and the earth. There is a shadowbox with dinosaurs, and on one table, a cardboard box containing second grade artist Morgan Cordani’s interpretation of a coral reef. He says, “I like the ocean and I like coral reefs.” He feels it’s an important part of our environment that needs to be saved and says he knows a lot about coral reefs. “There’s an angel fish, a blue tang, a trigger, a clown triggerfish,” represented in his artwork.
Thomas says the project was a homework assignment; the students didn’t spend any school time working on it.
According to second grade teacher Ashley Ring, while everything the students did was on their own, they’re constantly exposed to environmental education in school. The school recycles; they compost in the cafeteria. The kids pick up trash. “We recycle everything. We recycle bottle caps, we recycle bottles, we recycle cans, we recycle all our paper every Friday.”
They recently created a huge garden using what Ring calls “a lasagna effect.” One grade put down the newspaper, another watered it, and yet another grade put on the compost.
She says the school has a greenhouse, ponds, and “grow carts” lining the hallways. Grow carts have lights at the top and the plants go underneath in layers and can be moved around. Each grade has a raised bed where they work on projects.
Ring even has a 50-gallon trout tank in her classroom. The second grade students watched the eggs hatch, grow into adults, and the fish are being released this month at Peaks of Otter. “They’ve learned all about the water and keeping our water safe.” The environment permeates our whole curriculum,” she says. “We want everything they learn [about the environment] at school to transfer to home.”
By Beverly Amsler [email protected]