Last year students at the Shadow Lake Elementary started to dig a
rain garden at the front of the school. They added special plants to help the
rain garden filter the water. Then they attached the drain pipe that came off
the roof with Mr. Donaldson’s help and buried
it in the soil. When the rain started coming down the water wouldn’t drain {see
picture on right}. We waited over the summer to see what happened.
When we returned the next year, the rain garden was dry. About
five weeks into school, a Caterpillar came to dig the rain garden deeper
because the students couldn’t. Since the rain wouldn’t drain, we suspected that
there was a clay vein or a high water table in the ground.
To test those theories, Mrs. White’s class collected some data on
October 16th, 2012. First Mrs. White put a yard stick in the deepest
part of the rain garden and used rocks to make it stand up. Second, Mrs. White
put a hose next to the yard stick and then turned the water on. Our class went
out every fifteen minutes to see if the water was draining, we also took 5-7
pictures. Each time we checked on the rain garden the water height was 0 to 1
inches high so the rain garden is draining.
After a rainy week we went outside to see if the rain garden was
still draining and it was. There wasn’t a clay vein based on our experiment but
there might be a high water table.
Shadow Lake will continue monitoring the rain garden while it is
raining to see if it drains. Clearly this rain garden is a curious one!
Thanks to Mrs. White's Class and Green Team for this Post!
Our Green Team is in action! We've gotten the team together and we're ready to get moving at Tahoma Middle School. So far, we've chosen a t-shirt design,
started a school vegetable garden, and we are in the process getting
a PowerPoint to help advertise our club into motion. We're getting a great start in kicking off the year and plan to have a big impact. We're very excited about the garden, so the students at our school can have fresh vegetables to eat with their lunch. The PowerPoint
will bring attention to the Green Team and maybe even get some sixth
graders to join the cause. We all share the planet we live on, so we must take
care of it!
Last year students at the Shadow Lake Elementary started to dig a
rain garden at the front of the school. They added special plants to help the
rain garden filter the water. Then they attached the drain pipe that came off
the roof with Mr. Donaldson’s help and buried
it in the soil. When the rain started coming down the water wouldn’t drain {see
picture on right}. We waited over the summer to see what happened. 
To test those theories, Mrs. White’s class collected some data on
October 16th, 2012. First Mrs. White put a yard stick in the deepest
part of the rain garden and used rocks to make it stand up. Second, Mrs. White
put a hose next to the yard stick and then turned the water on. Our class went
out every fifteen minutes to see if the water was draining, we also took 5-7
pictures. Each time we checked on the rain garden the water height was 0 to 1
inches high so the rain garden is draining. 
