Thoughts on classroom worm bins

April 3, 2014

The list to the left has been living on my bulletin board for a few months and seeing it makes me smile every day.  It’s from a student in a grade 3 class at St Patrick’s Elementary who was excited to help harvest his classroom worm compost bin but who wasn’t completely enthusiastic about touching the worms and finished compost.  He put himself in charge of documenting all the organisms found in the worm bin and thoughtfully made me a copy of his list to take with me.

There are lots of reasons I get nerdily excited about worm composting (such as the beautiful finished product and how little time it takes for the worms to make it), but the most compelling one has to be what a great experience a classroom worm bin is for kids.  It is a little ecosystem tucked away in the class, it lets kids see and participate in the entire compost cycle, and it gets them into the habit of integrating positive environmental change into their daily routine.  Plus, it gives them an excuse to dig around in the dirt!

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