Bitterley School Outdoor Classroom Interim report up to end November 2008 Overall plan Create an active, thriving and sustainable area where the school children can take classes, grow vegetables, cook food, study wildlife and develop an awareness of the environment in their part of the Shropshire Hills AONB. On our first day we hit the ground running; six volunteers turned up on site fully motivated and ready to clear overgrown weeds, shrubs and overhanging branches. After a very constructive day they had created a sizable pile of brush and logs and we had begun to survey the site and prepare for the first part of the construction of the outdoor classroom the building of the earth oven. A few more site visits later, we had levelled an area and found some good hard-standing for the base of the oven. With the base marked out, the call was put out for donations of building materials and a bricklayer. Soon we had some 200 bricks and a volunteer built an excellent base to the specification of our oven builder, Richard Scadding. With only a one week to spare, the base was completed and materials donated for the earth oven build, including soil gathered from fields in the shadow of Titterstone Clee. The week of the build dawned clear and bright - with a good forecast for the whole week ahead. Monday morning started with a full school assembly where Cath Landles delivered a presentation on the Shropshire Hills AONB, which saw lots of interest and interactivity from the children. Richard Scadding followed with a talk on the tradition of cob building and the week s activities ahead. Work started immediately and the children soon had the sand former built and cob making could start in earnest. With heaps of enthusiasm, many little feet and hands were mixing up cob and laying the first layer. Classes were split into small groups, and by the end of day one the first layer was complete. Day two saw the second layer go on, and the third was taken up with the clay finishing layer which provided an opportunity for adding decoration in the form of pressed-in leaves and relief designs. The fourth and last day of the week saw Richard bring in his travelling festival oven and all the ingredients for a grand pizza baking day. The children prepared their dough and soon had a production line going, turning out dozens of delicious pesto, tomato and cheese pizzas enough for every child, teacher and teaching assistant to taste a just-baked wood-smoked pizza that only earth ovens can give. The day ended with an impromptu assembly where the head, Jane Bishop, was presented with a fresh loaf of bread, with thanks all round for all involved. In summary it was a thoroughly successful week with no problems, many happy children, a wonderfully unique experience and a really good start to the project. Only one little thing that could have been done differently - we should have arranged some music for the cob making sessions - spontaneous bouts of dancing very much need musical accompaniment! Final report up to end March 2009 After the success of the Earth Oven build week, we had quite an act to follow with the remainder of the Outdoor Classroom project! Over the winter there was a noticeable lull whilst Christmas and New Year took priority, but our group had several meetings and our numbers were boosted when Emma Hallett and her mother Jenny joined us to discuss planting and the overall structure of the space. Jenny works as a freelance garden designer and offered to draw up a planting plan that we could follow and when the plan arrived we all met again to draw up a schedule.
The plan helped us immensely as now the group had a clear vision and a goal to work toward. The plan includes raised vegetable beds, quiet areas, paths and shrub/flower borders. The following planned work day saw a record amount of volunteers turn up to turn the bones of the plan into reality, and the raised beds were built, paths edged, and borders dug over. The uprights for the roof over the oven were set in place, and I realised here how tricky it can be managing volunteers particularly those that have had design input. Whilst I had spent time with someone to draw a plan and shopping list for a roof of a certain size and footprint, I hadn t communicated this to the garden designer who had a plan in that showed a much smaller roof. After some careful diplomacy a compromise was found and the roof plans redrawn and a lesson learned. The raised beds made from timber left over from the clearing of the site. Uprights for the oven s roof in place telegraph poles from less than a mile away! The weather has been very kind to us with lots of unseasonal sunshine to warm the volunteers.
To right of this picture is a rather large pile of brush wood created from clearing the site. A great deal of this is useful fire wood for the oven, but the remainder needed to be cleared to allow work to continue. After many attempts to chip it using domestic sized shredders/chippers, it was decided that in order to avoid delays we should call in a commercial chipper. Local tree surgeon Alan Jones visited with his chipper and the pile was reduced in around three hours. The chippings were used as mulch for the paths along with the two tons of chippings donated by Alan Jones that day. Paths were edged with more of the spoil from the site clearance, and covered with the donated wood chippings. Here we are beginning to work out our bench seating circle on the hard standing area, and any logs left over from this will make up more benches around the garden. We negotiated the acquisition of some rather nice oak boards from a local farmer. Some 15 years ago he had a fallen oak planked and stored in a barn. As much as he would have like to donate this ideal timber, he had been slowly selling it to cabinet makers, and we had nine 8 lengths delivered
with 10 excellent railway sleepers, more wood chippings and some composted manure in time for one of our big days. The oak boards replaced the planned cob seating. Having built the oven, it became clear that the proposed cob seating was going to be a huge job. In order to build our 30 long cob seat, we were looking at sourcing, preparing and treading close to two tons of cob. Even with enthusiastic little feet, this was going to take a long time. Another concern was the protection of the cob bench it would either need a permanent roof or capping with a wooden board to protect it from the rain. Somehow the cob bench project was growing exponentially so after much deliberation we concluded that using some of the many logs on site with a durable seat was to be the easiest, achievable and long lasting solution. Having looked at commercially available timbers for the bench top, we were offered the oak boards, and as the timber had come from a fallen oak on a farm some 2 miles from the school this was taken as a sustainable and durable solution. The logs were secured with lengths of re-bar sourced from Border Engineering just outside Ludlow, and the bench tops attached to the top making for attractive and comfortable seating. As the end of March approached, we were able to plant some of Jenny s suggested planting, and although a great number of plants were donated, some had to be paid for. We hope to encourage not only more donations from parents, but that the gardening group grow some from seed and already a number of sunflowers are showing their heads and are close to being planted out in the beds. We still have the oven roof to construct, and intend to use much of the old hall floor along with salvaged timber to do this. The oven has been lit a number of times mostly to help it dry out but at times we have been able to reach close to cooking temperatures. We intend to have a full burn very soon in order to cook some bread or pizza as we need to learn how to light and manage the oven and pass this onto the teaching staff who will lead the pupils on the bake days. There are still some corners that need landscaping, but the heart of the outdoor classroom is in place we have the oven and the seating. Once the roof is over the oven we can clear the last of the old hall floor, find a home for the free wormery, sort the tool shed out, and kick-start the compost heap. Though not entirely finished at the end of March 09, momentum is up and running. Without official organisation, a number of volunteers return when they can to do the small jobs that remain. It is intended that we have a party at the end of May with a visiting dance group and food cooked in the oven. Fingers crossed for another sunny day!
UPDATE 6.7.09 The Outdoor Classroom will officially be opended on the 22 nd May 2009 with music, story telling, clay workshops and food. The gardening club has been meeting on a weekly basis to establish the vegetable plot.