Leonie says: “Besides lots of fun, exercise & fresh air, the students learn the life skill of growing their own organic food and experience many new fresh nutritious foods. It’s very rewarding to see the benefits they get from their garden.”

St Thomas More School: Sunshine Beach Year 5

Question: What do you like about your school permaculture garden?

Jacinta Ainsworth

“We don’t use any chemicals on the food. We learn to co-operate with each other especially when there are tomatoes to pick, which are my favourite.”

Hannah Wilkinson

“We learn how to grow plants and look after them. I started my own vegie garden at home.”

Kristen O’Donnell

“We get together and have fun. I like to eat the food we grow, especially the shallots.”

Noosaville State School Yr 6

Question : Why should schools have permaculture gardens?

Jaimee Gilbertson

“We don’t use any chemicals on our garden so the food we grow is a lot healthier. We get to experience lots of new food.”

Tianie Foster

“We have lots of native animals at our school and our garden won’t harm any of them because it’s eco-friendly. A permaculture garden saves money as we can pick it straight from the garden when the chefs come to cook with us. It’s a good experience.”

Siena Catholic College

Tell us about the garden you are working in at school.

Stella Curtis

“It’s a permaculture no dig garden. This means when we built the garden we didn’t dig the ground but put layers of straw, dirt, papers and compost to build up the garden.”

Sally Skelton

“Our garden is pretty and has lots of food. We watch the plants grow really big and then we get to eat them.”

Palmwoods State School
Question : Why do you love your school permaculture garden?
Mitch Smith

“We are helping the environment by composting and growing healthy food. We also grow food for the tuckshop.”

Soul Cormick

“I like to see all the different insects that visit our garden that help our plants grow. I enjoy using the special hook and pole to get the passionfruits off the tennis court fence.”

Jessica Lowes

“We pick lots of lettuces, silverbeet and herbs for the tuckshop. It’s good our tuckshop has lots of fresh food.”

Obesity is now more widespread than hunger and popular soft drinks now rate as the number one items in our shopping trolleys.

In permaculture we say, “find solutions, not problems”. The media and the government often talk about obesity and its associated problems, but talk on its own isn’t going to fix the issue.

Our solution was to bring the answer to the children and let them experience growing their own organic food. Let them see the whole cycle of seed, fruit, compost, worm castings and food-taste sensations. We wanted to let them explore natural flavours of freshly picked food.

Palmwoods State School was the first permaculture edible school gardens I set up from scratch with the students.  Funding was hard to come by so Clare Cox (School Community Enhancement Officer) combed the local community for donations. Fortunately, the local community saw the benefit in such a project.

In the meantime, the Year 6 students were busy learning about permaculture and design.

August 2004 came around and I was nervous we wouldn’t have enough helpers on the day; how wrong I was. Eighty-five people, including members of Permaculture Noosa, parents, grandparents, teachers and lots of kids turned out for our own garden blitz’ driven by the kids, for the kids.

Palmwoods Permaculture Patch was completed by nightfall. From there we have planted, composted, established worm farms and fed the chooks with the tuckshop scraps. We now grow most of our own mulch, use a banana pit (compost hole) which last time we emptied it, had 20 wheelbarrows of beautiful soil for our garden.

A few times each year we harvest lunch from our gardens. Salads are also shared with the tuckshop and sold to the local organic restaurant Sisters Cafe.

We are constantly hearing about the problems of children’s health and not the solutions. I have a solution for you – Permaculture Edible Gardens for all schools.

Currently I am working at four other schools and have another six keen to join. All this with very limited funds. With the proper funding let us turn the problems into solutions and place our children and the planet, on the healthy pathway.