What We Do

	Gardens We steward gardens as fresh-air learning labs where students can connect with nature, engage in hands-on discovery, and connect their learning to the real world. We grow a diverse abundance of vegetables, fruits, flowers, and pollinator-friendly plants in our gardens. Our gardens are living laboratories where students can find pollinators, decomposers, plants at every stage of their life cycle, and more. Our schools also use our gardens as a beautiful, outdoor space to calm the mind and refocus energy throughout the school day.
Curriculum Our Alabama-State Standards-based curriculum connects the garden to core subject through hands-on lessons. Science, math, reading, writing, social studies, health, and the arts are all integrated into our lessons. Our partner school teachers say that the garden program improves their students' abilities to connect classroom learning to the real world!
	Health and Nutrition Education Students in the Gardens 2 Schools program get the opportunity to plant and nurture seeds, care for them as they grow, and harvest and cook the vegetables they grew at the end of the season. Students who participate in the garden program are more likely to be willing to try new fruits and vegetables. Students get especially excited about our cooking and tasting days. Check out our Cooking Guide HERE!
Social Emotional Learning Our Garden Educators cultivate curiosity and foster joy, empathy,  and stewardship in the garden. Our partner school teachers say that students who participate in the garden program gain a sense of responsibility, self-control, and independence and that they are more likely to collaborate and work as a team in the garden.

Commitment to Belonging and Diversity

In our gardens, we believe that all students should have access to joy, love, knowledge, and safety.  As growers, we know that diversity in the garden creates undeniable resilience, and we are confident that the same is true for our world.  
 
Schoolyard Roots is dedicated to fostering a culture of inclusivity, diversity, safety, and respect for every member of our community and we commit to listening, reflection, conversation, learning, growth, and action in pursuit of these ideals. We seek to be a strong symbol of hope, equity, and belonging, bringing people together to cultivate curiosity, care, and connection in our gardens and our community. 

We want to set our students up to lead healthy lives. We need your help.

We dream that someday every school in Alabama will have a school garden. We need your help to make this happen. Will you partner with us in giving our students the opportunities they need to succeed? Ways to join us:

Donate  Get The Curriculum

How We Measure Success:

View Program Results Here.