Sparkman School will hold an Outdoor Classroom Day in partnership with the Alabama Outdoor Classroom Program on Mon., May 4. Students, parents, faculty, and community volunteers will help build and install a new son bird garden, a fish pond, a pollinator garden, a weather station, some educational signage, plus plant a variety of new trees, evergreens and fruit bushes, and other outdoor classroom learning stations on their school grounds in just one day.

The event will begin at 8 a.m. with shifts of students and volunteers cycling through until approximately 3 p.m.

Sparkman first began using their outdoor classroom through the Alabama Outdoor Classroom (AOC) Program in 2014, and the yare not working on Phase II. The outdoor classroom site is managed by their history teacher, Bob Brechtel, and teachers including Brechtel, Britt Randolph, Gina White, Debbie Bramlett, Tommy Holt, David Blankenship and Christy Barnett. The funds and support for Sparkman’s new outdoor learning stations come from an Alabama Rivers, Mountains and Valleys Resource Conservation and Development Grant along with donations and assistance from parents, the Alabama Wildlife Federation, Corum’s Building Supply, Lowes, George Plumbing, Hannah’s Lawn Service, Mr. and Mrs. Waymon Appleton, Traditions Fence, Vulcan Materials, C&L Wood Products and Morgan Co. District 2 Commissioner Randy Vest.

Throughout their Outdoor Classroom Day, students and volunteers will work side by side to enhance their current outdoor classroom site which serves as a “living laboratory” where students can participate in hands on activities that enhance what the teachers are already teaching in their indoor classrooms. Their new butterfly garden and songbird sanctuary will provide the students the opportunity to observe birds and butterflies that visit the outdoor classroom, and then report their observations on websites like Journey North and Cornell University’s eBird site. The students will become “citizen scientists” as they help track the migration of various bird and butterfly species. In addition, the school’s gardens will be used to grow vegetables and other annual plants, providing a wealth of activities from calculating the growth rate of the plants to studying the different parts of the plants first hand.

Through the Alabama Outdoor Classroom Program, Sparkman teachers will be able to provide new hands-on outdoor learning opportunities that allow students of all ages to utilize multiple-disciplinary skills in a fun and exciting environment. The AOC Program is a partnership between the Alabama Wildlife Federation (AWF), the Alabama Cooperative Extension System, and the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources that provides technical assistance for schools who want to develop sustainable outdoor classroom sites that can be utilized as effective teaching tools. At present, over 300 schools across Alabama are developing and using outdoor classroom sites through this program.