Swift House Enrichment Science Class Protects the Allen Brook through Service Learning

Some background from Williston Central School Enrichment Teacher Cris Milks:

Eleven students were selected to participate in an exciting Enrichment/Swift House collaborative project that was embedded in the Swift House Earth Systems Unit.  Within the unit, students had the opportunity to learn about a variety of earth science topics including the rock cycle and water cycle.  This project has been an authentic opportunity to learn how both the water cycle and rock cycle come into play in our community.  Completing independent research, meeting with Town Planner Jessica Andreoletti, and participating in a service project were integral parts of the class.

By Chiara Antonioli and Hannah Bohmann

 On Thursday December eighth, eleven students from Williston Central School’s Swift House took a field trip to the Allen Brook to help with the “Brook Project”. We left at eleven in the morning in our enrichment teacher and parent volunteer’s cars. When we got there we hiked down to the water to help tarp and wrap trees. Lauren Chicote, an AmeriCorp Environmental Educator from Winooski Valley Park District, was there to help us and show us what to do.   

We did this because the Allen Brook might overflow onto the ground and wash away the earth. Nothing could be left after the next big storm! As storm water flows into the Allen Brook the trees will stop erosion and suck up toxic chemicals and bacteria like E. Coli. With the trees there, it will stop the overflow and poison; the Allen Brook will be saved!

First we got into groups and started to put plastic tubes around the growing trees to prevent the deer from eating them. We worked in pairs to dig small trenches, slide the tubes on, and hold them in place with bamboo poles.  Once that was done, we had to put plastic mats around the base of the tree so critters (mice and other small creatures) wouldn’t eat the roots.  These are held in place with metal stakes.

 The trees will absorb toxins in the water so that our water is cleaner.  This means that it will be less expensive to purify for drinking and household water.   It costs less to purify nearly clean water then it does to purify toxic water. The trees will also hold the soil in place so when the river overflows, it won’t wash away all the soil.

We have taken the time to interview some of the people from our group.  We asked two students on the trip questions about their experience and about other ways we can keep our watershed healthy. 

 We asked Bennet Cheer, “How can we stop runoff from happening besides planting trees?” He responded, “You can insert a rain barrel and wash your car on the lawn, not on the pavement.” Inserting a rain barrel can help catch water running off your roof.   If you wash your car on pavement then all the toxins go straight into the storm drain without being cleaned by the grass and earth.

 We asked Morgan Roberts: “What do you think would be a result of further erosion and poison in the Allen Brook?” She responded, “The fish and their habitats would die out. It would turn into a dump! You wouldn’t be able to wade in it. Not pleasant…” This means that all of the erosion will make the brook walls larger and wider. All of the water will get shallower and shallower and eventually it will almost be completely gone. Another thing that could happen would be all of the plants and grass would grow in it because of fertilizer washing into the brook. Fertilizer is washed off of farm land and yards during storms.  It could turn into a swamp from all the toxins and bacteria pouring in from the storm drains.

 We asked our Swift House teacher and service project helper, Amy Skapof, “Have you ever seen erosion in your day to day life?” Skapof replied, “Yes! Killington, on the side of the road.   Also on trails after Hurricane Irene.”

 We asked Karen Cutler, a parent volunteer on our trip, “How did you feel about this field trip as a great learning experience?” Cutler responded: “As a mom, I get into the habit of thinking that kids need instruction, supervision, and prodding to get real work done.  What I love about projects like this is seeing how you young people can self-organize into teams and work efficiently and responsibly, pretty much on your own.  Of course you need some instruction at first, to know what to do, and adult supervision is important to keep everyone safe, but you guys kicked butt out there and got everything done on time.  I think you had fun doing it, too.  I can’t tell you how happy it made me to see you all working so cooperatively; I’ve known some of you since first grade, and you have learned so much since then.  I think I had a glimpse of the future… and it looks good.”

Our community service trip was very fun and we learned so much. Wrapping and tubing trees is a great way to learn and experience science. This would be a great hands-on project to do with other small groups for school. 

Rock Cycle

Morgan Roberts and Johnny Colt

During our Swift House Enrichment course we have been learning about Earth systems. In this unit we have been learning about the rock cycle and the water cycle.  What we have learned about these earth systems has helped us to understand how and why storm water runoff is such a big issue in Williston.

The rock cycle is a cycle that rocks take on their life.  Rocks cycle through the three different types of rock over very long periods of time.  The rock types are sedimentary, Metamorphic, and Igneous.  Sedimentary rock is formed when sand, pebbles, and shells  and other sediments are compressing together over many years. Metamorphic rock occurs when existing rocks change because of increased heat and pressure. Igneous rock is when magma cools and hardens, for example when lava cools.

A metamorphic rock is formed when the rock is under ground, and it starts heating and is under a lot of pressure.  It starts to melt and stretch which means that it sort of looks like the rock it started out as but stretched out and melted. An example of this is gneiss.

An igneous rock is formed when the rock is far underground where it is very hot.  As it reaches the surface (as a volcano) or close to the surface it starts to harden and crystallize.  If it cools quickly it can be all shiny and smooth like obsidian. When igneous rocks come up to the surface and weatherize and then erosion happens and then it gets laid back down as sediment to makes sedimentary rock.

The way this works is when sedimentary rock deforms and turns into metamorphic rock. Metamorphic rock melts and crystallizes and turns into Igneous rock. Then Igneous rock weathers to the surface then erosion happens and depositions and compacts to make sedimentary rock. That’s how the rock cycle works.

The rock cycle is what makes us have rocks of different types, so if we didn’t have this system, there probably would only be sand.  All and all the rock cycle is really important, that’s our way of finding diamonds, gold and other special rocks. If we didn’t have this systems all of our rocks would always stay the same and nothing would ever happen to them. Just think if we didn’t have this system?

Water Cycle

Ananth Malladi, Baxter Bishop and Prince Yodishembo

The same water cycles again and again. 

 Step 1  Water starts as runoff from precipitation and drains to a lake or an ocean or another large water body.

Step 2  The water starts in a lake or a stream and evaporates to form water vapor.  Water vapor also comes from plants during transpiration.

Step 3  Water condenses in the cloud. When enough water molecules build up in a cloud, it gets heavy enough to rain down. This is called precipitation.  Precipitation could also be snow, hail or ice.

Step 4  When the water reaches the ground it goes into the ground.  This is called infiltration. The water travels underground. When it feeds back into waterways or the ocean is called the subsurface outflow. It can also come out on the ground in springs or be stored underground in aquifers.

The water lands on pavement and goes into the sewer.  The water travels throughout the sewer until it is dumped out into a lake or an ocean. With the Allen Brook, water travels from that to the Winooski river, which travels to lake Champlain, which leads to the Atlantic ocean.

The rain goes straight into a body of water like a spring, river, lake or an ocean.       

 The cycle starts all over again.

Watershed Health

 Bennett Cheer and Jeff Goldman

According to the Town of Williston Comprehensive Plan for Watershed Health, the development of Williston has increased over the past several years.   This has affecting the volume, velocity, and quality of surface runoff in the town.  These changes are affecting the stability of the stream’s channel and the heath of the aquatic, wetland, and riparian communities along the stream.   Impacts created by land use in these areas, along with state and federal laws, have moved Williston to make watershed management a major priority.  The Allen Brook has been placed on the state list of impaired waters.

An example of how erosion and runoff brings sediment and nutrients into the water is that there has been a very large amount of dangerous blue green algae blooms in Lake Iroquois in the past two years.  An example of development near waterways can be seen as Vermont technical College is facing growth and wants to build an extra parking lot to accommodate for its new students.  As reported in the Williston Observer, “The school population is growing each year around 5 percent, and to accommodate that growth in the next year, we need more parking,” said Michael Burke, a senior project engineer with Kerbs & Lansing. The idea was stopped by the Williston Development Review Board (DRB) which cited associated environmental concerns.

There are several things Williston is doing to control erosion and water pollution. The first thing the town is doing is putting in rain gardens. Rain gardens treat and slow down polluted water that comes from tar surfaces and other impervious surfaces. Williston is also asking for people to put in downspouts with gutter extensions. These prevent erosion because rather than creating runoff they make it so the water goes into the ground. The third thing Williston is doing is having outreach workshops to teach people how to make and use rain barrels. These prevent erosion because the water will not turn into runoff which badly erodes the ground.   They have more information about what homeowners can do to keep the watershed healthy at http://www.smartwaterways.org/.

 

As you my or not know, the Allen Brook is slowly eroding and being polluted. The town approved up to $114,119 in funds to help this problem. Over 43.59 acres of land is being preserved so that trees can be planted there to suck in toxins and prevent erosion of the Allen Brook.  This year, 17 acres of trees were planted and over 23 acres of conservation easements were created.

 

On Friday, December 16th we went to the Town Planning and Zoning Office to have an interview with Planner Jessica Andreoletti.  We asked her for some examples of what Williston is doing to manage stormwater. She replied that Williston is:

• Street sweeping to keep dirt out of the watershed by keeping storm drains clear.
• The town also sponsors outreach and education workshops are being held for homeowners.
• Scientists are studying the banks of the Allen Brook and other waterways to look for erosion.  They are also monitoring waterways for water quality.
• Williston is putting in retention ponds in new development to keep the water from turning into runoff too quickly and causing erosion.
• Homeowners within150 feet of named waterways and 50 feet of unnamed waterways have to say that they will not build anything on their land.  Homeowners may be able to build if they do mitigation to increase the waterway health in another way.

 

The town is also doing active restoration which is construction like cutting banks and putting in fish lunkers (habitat for fish). Some of the passive stream restoration things that are going on around the Allen Brook are that trees are being planted on the banks to hold the soil in place and take out harmful nutrients and toxins. They are also getting conservation easements so no one builds anything else around the stream. So far there has not been any evidence of the water quality getting better on the Allen Brook.  Although it’s hard to predict, Andreoletti hopes that water quality will begin to improve in the next ten years.

 

The town of Williston keeps our watershed healthy by keeping people from building without carefully planning.  If erosion is not controlled over time, rivers would erode until they ate away houses and buildings, pollution would kill all bugs and fish, and there would be algae blooms that would eliminate dissolved oxygen in the water and kill fish and bugs.  

 

For this project, we used these sources:                                                                           
1. Stormwater Projects in Williston – Stormwater – Town of Williston, Vermont (website)
2. Williston Observer Board approves Brook project By Adam White October 6, 2011 Observer staff
3.Vermont Tech wants to add a lot, DRB cites environmental issues Dec. 1 2011 By Luke Baynes Observer staff
4.Town Of Williston 2011 DRAFT Comprehensive Plan CHAPTER 11 WATERSHED HEALTH

5. December 16^th Interview with Town Planner Jessica Andreoletti

Storm Water Runoff (And how it Affects Watershed Health)

Molly Duncan and Julia Neeld

Storm Water Runoff is when you have rain that gets dirty or polluted and it gets into streams then rivers and then larger bodies of water. This will do a lot of harm to our environment. Because the water is polluted it can harm and/or kill aquatic life. Town workers and managers have had to close some small lakes or bodies of water that people swim in because it is so polluted. Williston has been failing the water quality tests. What has been happening is that algae is blooming near lakes and dogs are eating them and dying. There is also a lot more that has been happening so please visit: www.smartwaterways.com to learn more about it and see what you can do!

There are lots of things we can do to prevent this. One way that you can prevent this is by putting a rain barrel near your gutter so that it can collect rain. This will help because on the waters way down to the sewer, it may collect sorts of things like cans, bottles, cigarettes, and all the other garbage that is on the ground. Also it may collect oil from cars. So what the rain barrels does is it keeps all of that water from going down into the sewer, and that will help a lot. Also it not only helps bodies of water from polluting, but it also helps prevent bodies of water from flooding, and erosion.

Another way to prevent storm water runoff is if you can put a gutter extension on your house, then it can decrease roof and driveway runoff. This will help because it allows the water to be filtered out naturally through the ground before it goes into the waterway through the ground.

One of the last things that you can do to prevent runoff is by putting a rain garden in front of your house. A rain garden is a bowl shaped garden. It is supposed to absorb and clean all of the rain before it goes into and bigger bodies of water.

We hope that you take action and try to help us prevent storm water runoff by doing any of these things to help. You can help by putting a rain barrel in your yard, attaching a gutter extension to your house, or by putting a rain garden in front of your house.  You can also do anything else that you have learned about that can help storm water runoff and improve watershed health. Thank you.

Enrichment Garden Science Class

A group of 5^th and 6^th graders from across the school has been working with Andrew the Gardener, Mrs. Gigliotti and Mrs. Milks to understand our school garden, management of this and all gardens,  and how the vegetation around the garden has developed over time.  As part of the class, students completed research for and produced the following blog entries.  Service was also a major component of the course and the students participated in service sessions in which they put the school gardens to bed, turned, spread and stacked the compost, and assisted 3rd and 4th grade art classes in a soap making project.

Plants vs. Weeds    

Angela Tarracciano, Shayla Lawrence, and Nick Petrunich       

              

Plant	Weed
A plant is something that you plant!                 Some plants that you would find in the garden here at school are mint, broccoli, kale, and Brussel sprouts.	Weeds are plants that naturally grow on their own.  Some weeds you would find in our garden is dandelion and grass.

 

 

The WCS Medicinal Plant Bed

Sierra Polley

The following plants can be found in our WCS Garden medicinal plant bed.  Please see the table for potential uses.

Information taken from: Bremness, Lesley. Herbs. New York: Dorling Kindersley, 2002. Print.

Plant		Medicinal Uses
Echinacea		Stimulates the body’s defenses against disease.  It is antibiotic, antiviral and restores inflamed connective tissue, treats fevers and may reduce allergies.
Mint		Stimulate digestion and reduce flatulence.  Helps get rid of colds and can relieve headaches and other pain.  If you inhale the essential oil, you can treat nausea.
Sage		The volatile oils in sage kill bacteria, making the herb useful for all types of bacterial infections.
Sunflower		The seeds can be used to treat coughs and kidney inflammation.  The root is a laxative and treats stomach pain.
Wild Strawberry		Used to relieve kidney and liver issues.  Can be made into juice that may relieve fevers.  Soothes sunburn and lightens freckles.  Makes a common herbal tea and can be used as an oily skin tone

 

Enrichment Garden Class works to Put The WCS Garden To Bed

How to Put a Garden to Bed

Evan Turner and Nick Durieux

It’s the end of the season and you have all this good and nutritious stuff going to waste. All these useful ideas could be used to make sure you are making the most of your garden this year and preparing it for a great growing season next year.

 How to put a garden to bed:

1. Play “Dead or Alive”.  We pulled out lots of dead plants from the garden clean out service session.
2. Dead goes to compost.
3. Choose what you want to eat and eat it.  We ate cale and broccoli.
4. See if we can harvest seeds from anything.  In our medicinal plant garden we kept the big aster, strawberries, and Echinacea plant.  We also kept the sage and some mint.  We cut and dried echinacea flowers and sunflowers so that we can plant the seeds later.
5. Turn the soil and add compost.

 

Tools that will help you put a garden to bed:

• snippers-make sure to secure the lock when you are not using these
• spading fork- get weeds out by roots
• rake- for raking and smoothing
• forked hoe- to rip open the ground (loosens soil in long line, and then you can take out the weeds
• Grabby fork- like rake, only grabber
• Wheelbarrow- for carting stuff

 NO More wasted plants and a happy garden for the future!

 

Enrichment Garden Class Participates in Science-Art Collaboration

Having Fun AND Learning at The Same Time!

Danielle Urban & Shannon Loiseau

Equinox house third and fourth grade students worked with Andrew (The gardener), Ms. Baker, Ms. Amanda from Equinox, Ms. Milks, and the Garden Class student helpers  to use their math, science, art and team work skills to make a soap. They made a variety of different soaps using herbs, plants and oils.

One recipe that they developed contained yarrow, birch, lavender, ylang ylang, a bit of oatmeal, a drop of sage and a Shea butter soap base. Another recipe included birch, clove, wintergreen, oatmeal and an olive oil base. Although the classes developed different recipes, they were similar.

Some of the ingredients the students had to choose from were:

Herbs	Oils
Birch- Pain Relief Yarrow- Skin astringent (cleanser) Calendula- Skin astringent (cleanser) Oatmeal- Skin calming Rose Buds- Relieves stress Mint- Energizing Lavender- Calming scent Anise Hyssop- Scent Beet Root- Pink Color Ailonet- Red/Brown Color	Clover- Comfort and Pain Relief Rosemary- Awakening Eucalyptus- Cleansing Patchouli- Relaxing Ylang Ylang – Relaxing Vetiver- Grounding Wintergreen- Awakening

The students could choose one oil and a variety of different herbs and plants. If you want to make soap we would recommend to pick plants, herbs and oils that go well with each other.

We hope you have fun making your sensational soap!  Soap you later!

Enrichment Garden Class Composts

Composting

Jessica Gagne

Compost is a nutrient rich soil that you get when you mix kitchen scraps and yard waste. When these things decompose, compost is created.

 WHAT YOU NEED

• Brown stuff- for example, dried grass, leaves and shredded newspaper (carbon rich)
• Green stuff-for example, vegetable peels and fruit rinds (nitrogen rich)
• Dirt, water, compost turning tool like a pitchfork
• Compost bin (or spot for a compost pile)

HOW TO MAKE THE COMPOST

1. First you need a compost bin.  You can buy or make your own bin.  See the links below for how to build your own bin.
2. Layer your brown and green materials.  You need a mix of brown and green stuff.  See http://www.compostinstructions.com/about/for more information.
3. Water it.  Compost needs to be damp like a squeezed out sponge.  It should be able to drain easily.
4. Turn your compost to increase air flow.  To increase air flow, you can turn your compost with a shovel or pitchfork every few days or once a week.

 

 

Learn More About Composting

Shorya Malhotra, Tommy Zych, Skyler Blow, MattYakubik

The following links could help you with composting.  As part of our garden class, we learned about how to compost.  A few of us reviewed a bunch of websites for composting as a smaller group project.  We think these might be most helpful links.

VIDEOS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kq3yfKCC9ok

WEBSITES FOR HOW TO COMPOST

http://www.composting101.com/what-to-use.html

http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/composting-for-dummies-cheat-sheet.html

 

Garden Design for Enrichment Garden Class

Garden Design

Alexa Pudlo and Taylor Antonioli

In our garden class we learned about how to design a garden.  Things to keep in mind when starting a garden:

• What size garden bed do you need for spacing of the plants? We learned that different plants need different amounts of space.  For example, summer and winter squash need a lot of space, but carrots don’t need a lot of space.  Sometimes plants can be put closer together than Gardening books say.  One way to use space well is to put plants at the edge of the garden and let them flow out onto the grass. 
• Soil quality and depth needed for plants. Some plant need different types and depths of soil.  If you plant a carrot and you don’t know what kind of soil you’re planting it in, it might not be very good.
• How will you (and the school) use what you are planting?  We had two beds to plan for (see bottom photo below).   In one bed, we planned to grow cucumbers, melon, and squash because that’s what the kids in our group like to eat (first photo).  Another group planned an herb garden with thyme, parsley, cilantro, basil and chives, because that’s what the kitchen here at school uses most (second photo).
• It’s better to plan out your garden on paper first.  See our plans below.