Everything but Tarzan in school’s jungle

Annual rainforest unit sports wild things

Friday, May 9, 2008

Click here to enlarge this photo Staff photo by GARY SMITH Matt Hobson, left, Bradley Carruth and Emma Thompson lead visitors through the part of the third-grade classroom that they helped transform into a rainforest model at St. Mary’s Bryantown School. E-Mail This Article | Print This Story Click here to enlarge this photo Staff photo by GARY SMITH Austin Brown samples some rainforest-inspired foods at St. Mary’s Bryantown School.

Traditional and confined to the classroom, the wildest the schoolwork would get was when Garner brought in a couple of plants to give the kids a tangible idea of what they were studying.

Then, about 11 years ago, she mentioned to her husband, Danny, that she’d like to do ‘‘something small” during the rainforest unit to pique more interest.

‘‘I don’t go with small,” said Danny Garner, a driver’s education instructor. ‘‘If the kids are going to learn, let’s go all the way.”

With a field trip to the National Zoo and by incorporating the rainforest into various lessons, such as art and computer research work, the kids learn while participating in hands-on projects.

‘‘It makes the instruction fun and they learn at the same time,” said Principal Sharon Caniglia. ‘‘It’s the best of both worlds.”

Since that first year, every spring the Garners take their spring break vacation week to turn her classroom into a life-size diorama (or as close as you can get inside a classroom) of the rainforest, with a tunnel shrouded in vines, prowled by papier-mâché animals and carpeted with leaves.

And unlike the world’s real rainforests, which are being depleted by rampant farming and logging, the one at St. Mary’s grows each year.

‘‘It keeps expanding,” said Caniglia, standing in the school’s foyer last week under a parrot kite the size of a large beach umbrella while a fountain burbled somewhere hidden among jungle brush. ‘‘Hopefully we’ll get to save more of the rainforest.”

On May 1, parents, students and members of the community stood in line waiting for a tour of the class’s project with Garner’s 25 students serving as tour guides.

Another addition this year is a small bridge — donated by a former student — that leads sightseers to the school’s hall for refreshments.

This is a far cry from the first year when the entire shebang fit into Garner’s tiny classroom.

While showing off vast knowledge of the rainforest, the students use the event to raise money — through plant sales and raffles — to purchase acreage in the endangered area for conservation purposes.

And they’ll tell you why that’s so important too.

Billy Whalen, 9, said that when he was in second grade he knew ‘‘very little” about the rainforests, which are called the ‘‘jewels of the Earth,” but now that he has almost completed third grade and learned about the still undiscovered millions of plant and insect species hidden in the rainforest, he’ll do all he can to protect it.

‘‘The rainforest is just like a sponge,” he said, explaining that it traps water and releases it a bit at a time.

Billy said he was fascinated not only with the animals of the rainforest (his research project was on the black caiman, an alligator-like reptile) but also the foliage.

‘‘What’s so amazing about it is that it has very shallow soil,” he said. ‘‘But the trees somehow still grow in it. The roots don’t go down, they go out.”

‘‘Without the rainforest we would have floods and droughts,” said Matt Hobson, 8.

‘‘If we cut it down there would be no medicine,” said Bradley Carruth, 8. ‘‘A lot of the rainforest is layers and we have to protect it.”