Green fingered pupils at Nagle Rice National School win ‘Let’s GROW’ 2024 initiative

To secure the much-coveted win, the national school created a sensory garden, titled ‘Tadgh’s Garden’ in memory of a past pupil.

The garden is a feast for the senses featuring flowers, water features, a beautiful colourful mural, and grown produce including cucumbers, radishes, garlic, tomatoes and peppers.

The garden is also fully wheelchair accessible in keeping with the school’s inclusive practices and is available for all students to enjoy and appreciate.

Mrs Jan Keirns at Nagle Rice National School who leads the gardening groups said: “Our garden is colourful, tactile and visually stimulating, providing our students with an outside classroom.

“This space helps our students to develop a lifelong love and appreciation of growing their own produce, while simultaneously motivating students to eat the healthy produce they have grown.

“Children are usually more inclined to eat things they have prepared and grown themselves.

“While the produce in the garden has many nutritional benefits for the children, the garden also provides a safe space to help regulate the emotions that school can bring.

“We have seen both students and teachers taking advantage of the relaxing environment of the garden, where they can take a stroll and have a place to properly relax during the busy school day.”

She continued: “We’ve taken inspiration from GIY and SuperValu Let’s GROW, as the kits and information provided knowledge for both myself and the teachers of the school.

“This initiative has made growing our own foods stress-free and has been fun for both teachers and kids alike, one we hope to make a regular occurrence.

“It’s a fantastic initiative and I hope that it encourages other schools to give growing their own food a try.”

To date the GIY and SuperValu Let’s GROW initiative has supported and enabled over 100,00 children to learn how to grow food at school.

In April, each of the schools taking part in the SuperValu Let’s GROW initiative received everything they needed to start growing their own vegetables in the classroom.

Through this initiative, schools were provided with packets of seeds, compost discs and pots for growing, as well as teacher resource packs with curriculum-linked lesson plans and activities.

The pupils in Nagle Rice National School rose to the top and beat off stiff competition from across the country to win the project - they were deemed winners due to their incredible enthusiasm and for successfully bringing their whole community along on their journey.

Founder of GIY, Michael Kelly explained: “It’s always a joy to witness children experience the process of growing food, especially for the first time.

“They are usually amazed that they could grow something and more amazed that they can then eat what they have grown.

“Our partners in this campaign are SuperValu and without them, we wouldn’t be able to bring these experiences to children across the country each year.

“Growing your own food is a lifelong skill and one that we need to embrace more and more as the world adapts to climate change. It is truly inspiring to see these fantastic food growers at Nagle Rice National School - they epitomise everything that this initiative is about.”

SuperValu interim managing director, Luke Hanlon said: “At SuperValu, we’re aware of the pivotal role we can play in teaching children about the importance of eating fresh, seasonal and local vegetables.

“Our recent consumer research shows that 88% of Irish adults agree that supermarkets have an important role in teaching children the importance of fresh, seasonal products.

“The SuperValu Let’s GROW initiative in conjunction with GIY, gives us an opportunity by which to arm the younger generation with knowledge and to set them on a path in growing their own food.

“Starting at a young age, this sets the foundation for a lifelong practice where young growers are more likely to choose healthy and seasonal foods in their diet.

“This initiative gives me immense pride, and I’m delighted to see SuperValu supporting our youngest generation of food growers.”

As 2024 winners, the students at Nagle Rice National School were awarded a €1,000 school garden from GIY, made possible by SuperValu.

The national Let’s GROW campaign is run by the not-for-profit social enterprise, GIY, and 2024 is the second year of a three-year partnership with SuperValu to deliver classroom-based food growing and food literacy education.

For further details visit www.supervaluletsgrow.ie