Botha School students have planted trees in their community playground recently as part of their project-based learning curriculum.
"The project is one that arose out of our school inquiry based learning approach where we set forth to investigate trees," said teacher Mike Flieger.
"The reason why we chose to investigate was the fact that the kids were asking questions about the brush piles they were seeing along the highway east of Botha. Why are people cutting down all the trees? Why don't we cut down all of the trees?"
The tree planting project was sponsored with a $500 donation from the village which was reciprocated by an equal amount by the Botha School administration.
"In addition, we had a parent, Kelly Heer, who felt very strongly about the clear cutting of these trees, and she purchased some from the people who were cutting and had them transplanted to her own property, which we visited," Flieger continued. Heer donated two trees to be planted by the kids at the community playground.
"The planting of trees was a solution which was decided upon by the kids as
a way to achieve balance - cut down a tree, plant a tree," he said.