Garden & Farm Curriculm
Summerfield’s Farm produces a seasonal bounty of fruits, vegetables and flowers, and is a core part of the curriculum for classes from preschool through twelfth grade. We are the only school in the state that integrates a working Demeter Certified Biodynamic® farm into our curriculum; protected by a land trust, the Farm is a foundational part of our campus and our ethic.
At the Farm, children have the opportunity to learn many basic skills that are rapidly becoming lost in today’s industrialized society. By tending soil, turning the compost, planting perennial gardens, harvesting vegetables for soup, caring for farm animals, and pruning and grafting, each child gains a deeper awareness of the natural world.
The school is deeply committed to preserving and maintaining the Farm and the open space. That commitment to the land was affirmed in 1982 with a legally binding Land Trust requiring the school to protect and nurture the land the wildlife refuge in perpetuity.
Preschool: Animal visits, carrot digging, seasonal walking and a snack. One hour each week on the Farm.
Kindergartens: Seasonal rhythms, cider pressing, potato gathering, pumpkin harvesting, animal feeding and visits, egg gathering, snacks, building a fire to cook things on, walking in the corn rows.
First Grade: First Grade garden, thistle digging in the pastures, corn shelling, apple pressing and drying, leaf raking.
Second Grade: Garden work, planting seeds, digging and weeding, social skills in the garden, sawing wood, harvesting beets.
Third Grade: Harvesting onions, potatoes, popcorn, field corn, winter squash and pumpkins, sowing a cover crop, birdhouse building, tree dressing, planting corn, onion, winter squash and pumpkins, sheep shearing.
Fourth Grade: Animal care, cleaning the duck pond and rabbit cages, gathering cowpies from the pasture and manure from the barns and chicken house, plus pruning and mulching the roses
Fifth Grade: Broom-making, animal care, and sketching plants for main lesson Botany block.
Sixth Grade: Broom corn harvest, maintaining compost bins, tool identification and maintenance, double-digging in student gardens, caning raspberries, seed planting, and potting.
Seventh Grade: Potato sorting, building toolboxes for a carpentry project.
Eighth Grade: Harvesting, cooking, nutrition Study, basket-weaving; using natural materials gathered on site.
Ninth Grade: Permaculture gardening, Herbal studies; research and practical application of the use of culinary and medicinal herbs.
Tenth Grade: Permaculture gardening, grafting of Fruit Trees.
Eleventh Grade: Plant cultivation and propagation, greenhouse work.
Twelfth Grade: Sustainable agriculture projects; individually chosen projects that serve the community.
Electives (High School Only): Sustainable Agriculture; farming, harvesting, cooking and preserving.
The understanding that Mother Nature is now ailing and that humanity must take the responsibility to nurture our mother back to health is inherent in the Biodynamic approach. It is this responsibility to the earth and this healing, holistic approach that can bring to education what is most especially needed in our age. -Rudolf Steiner