KDES students harvest sweet potato ivy crop at House One garden

Image: KDES students work at the sweet potato harvest at the House One garden on November 21 with Trudy Haselhuhn from Gallaudet. (Photo: KDES student photographer)

KDES students work at the sweet potato harvest at the House One garden on November 21 with Trudy Haselhuhn from Gallaudet. (Photo: KDES student photographer)

Image: KDES students look at earthworm on sweet potato vine recently pulled out of ground at the House One garden. (Photo: KDES student photographer)

Image: KDES students look at earthworm on sweet potato vine recently pulled out of ground at the House One garden. (Photo: KDES student photographer)

KDES students look at earthworm on sweet potato vine recently pulled out of ground at the House One garden. (Photo: KDES student photographer)

The first and second graders of Kendall Demonstration Elementary School (KDES) have been in involved for two years with a gardening project at the invitation of Gallaudet University's First Lady, Vicki Hurwitz. The students have planted a vegetable garden on the grounds of the University president's home, known on campus as House One.

Each fall for the last two years, Vicki Hurwitz has invited the first and second graders for a pre-Halloween harvest pumpkin fest (the first pumpkin crop was sabotaged by local raccoons and squirrels-the pumpkins used for decorating were purchased at a local nursery.) This November, the University horticulturalist, Trudy Haselhuhn, and Hurwitz invited the students to come and help Haselhuhn dig up the underground tubers from the sweet potato ivy vine the classes had planted in the spring at the back of House One.

On this field trip, the students decided that they wanted to participate in the photo documentation of the activity! During the walk over students captured images of each other, Gallaudet buildings, trees, sidewalks, and shoes, and their teachers. At House One, they took photos of the digging of the sweet potatoes (a minimal harvest of small dirt covered purple color tubers), worms (fascination and EEEEW responses), Haselhuhn's tractor, and a drop by visit from Vicki Hurwitz. The students have already developed a keen interest in being a gardening bug, now it seems they have been bitten by the "photography bug", too!