Armed with wide-brimmed hats and child-sized gardening gloves, year 4 students on the NSW Far South Coast are swapping schoolbooks for tree saplings in a bid to boost biodiversity in their playground.
Students from St Peter's Anglican College at Broulee have spent the past week transforming a barren patch of their playground into what will become a self-sustaining microforest, to create a cooler, greener space.
Students have planted about 1,000 plants native to the region’s endangered coastal littoral rainforest. (ABC South East NSW: Mikayla McGuirk-Scolaro)
"We're trying to bring back some of those endangered species that were lost in the 2020 bushfires, which was really unfortunate for all of our native animals and plants," year 4 student Zale Neal said.
"It feels really calming to plant all these plants, and to know that when we get older, we can have a microforest and say to our kids we've done that."
It is the first school in NSW to partner with not-for-profit organisation Microforest Collective to research, design and plant a microforest as part of the curriculum.
One-of-a-kind project
Microforests, or tiny forests, are dense patches of native vegetation planted in urban or degraded areas, often no bigger than a tennis court.
Microforest Collective co-founder and landscape architect Edwina Robinson said the project used a Japanese planting technique known as the Miyawaki method, which involved densely planting a mixture of local species to accelerate growth.
She said the method helped the plants grow up to 10 times faster than normal, with the microforest expected to reach about 7 metres in height within two to three years.
Edwina Robinson discovered the Miyawaki method after the 2019-2020 bushfires. (ABC South East NSW: Mikayla McGuirk-Scolaro)
"Forests take hundreds of years to develop, but with this method we're actually short circuiting a lot of that,"
Ms Robinson said.
The school project uses a water-harvesting system designed to overcome the site's sandy soil.
About 40 metres of underground trenches have been lined with clay to capture rainwater.
Microforest Collective raised $20,000 to create the Eurobodalla's first microforest at St John’s Anglican Church in Moruya. (ABC South East NSW: Mikayla McGuirk-Scolaro)
Ms Robinson said the aim was to create resilient green spaces that could also help communities respond to a changing climate.
"By careful plant selection and good improvement of the soil, we can really change our microclimate and we can start creating shade," she said.
Students followed the Miyawaki planting method, which involves densely planting a mixture of local species to accelerate growth. (ABC South East NSW: Mikayla McGuirk-Scolaro)
Hundreds of plants in the ground
Students, teachers and volunteers have spent the past week planting about 1,000 plants native to the region's endangered coastal littoral rainforest.
Year 4 teacher Danielle Phillips said the group visited local rainforests, identified species and researched the conditions different plants needed to survive, before picking up gardening gloves.
Danielle Phillips says the project incorporated subjects such as maths, science and geography. (ABC South East NSW: Mikayla McGuirk-Scolaro)
She said students then completed a site analysis before designing where plants should go using science, maths, geography and literacy.
"When we were looking at the area that we were going to plant, how big is the area? What are we going to do regarding the amount of mulch? OK, well, let's work out the volume," Ms Phillips said.
"These kids are learning social emotional skills out here. How they connect, how they communicate, how they work as a team, what happens when things get challenging."
Students spent a week planting native trees, shrubs and climbing plants. (ABC South East NSW: Mikayla McGuirk-Scolaro)
Growing up beside the forest
The collective now plans to use the project as a model for other schools.
Chair Jo Abbott said members had worked with the school's teachers to develop design templates and programs.
Jo Abbott hopes the project will be replicated by other schools. (ABC South East NSW: Mikayla McGuirk-Scolaro)
"If a school decided to take on a forest, they would be able to pick up these ready-to-go curriculum programs and then implement them within their school environment," she said.
Although Ms Abbott had doubts about how the students would feel getting their hands dirty, she said she was surprised by how enthusiastically they had taken to it.
"They are kids that spend a lot of time in nature, and enjoy being out doing hard work," she said.
The students will grow up with the microforest as they progress through school. (ABC South East NSW: Mikayla McGuirk-Scolaro)