Isobel Mair School
Class Arran’s sensory wildlife garden
Our garden celebrates and encourages nature into our playground. It also celebrates using recycled and upcycled materials. The entire cost of our garden was £11 as we reused and recycled all the materials to build the garden structure and our local Waitrose donated soil and herbs. We grew our own peas and potatoes.
This subject was chosen as we have been learning about living things and what they need to grow and thrive. David is also part of the Eco committee so recycling and looking after wildlife is important to our class.
Books to read
Tasty food for birds
Gardening tools handy
Our garden is wildlife friendly as it has bird feeders, a bug hotel and herbs which encourage bees and insects to visit.
All of the plants in our garden are edible. This is very important to our design as one of the young people will put everything into their mouth. Some of the young people in class have limited diets so it has been lovely for them to experience new smells and tastes and grow their own vegetables.
The garden is designed to encourage nature and also to be a sensory experience for the young people. The plants are highly fragranced and safe to eat. The garden has board maker symbols to indicate where the gardening tools are. There is also a space to store books, so we are able to read outside and enjoy our garden.
The main structure of our garden was made from a pallet crate and all of the wood was recycled from an old playhouse. The only thing we had to buy was the trellis to grow the peas up.
As a class we have learned about teamwork, we learned about the importance of recycling and reusing materials. One of our class members is part of the Eco Schools committee and the theme of upcycling and reusing materials is something we all feel passionate about.
We were very lucky to have a link with our local Waitrose who provided the soil and herbs. Also, our janitor Joe helped to build the structure to hold the plants.
Our garden will remain in our playground for everyone to enjoy. We may turn it into a wildflower garden if the herbs outgrow the planter.
Garden design
Creating the garden – from design to reality
