Building our Green City We began the first week of our Spark 2018 summer program with four empty expanses, and ended with a vibrant and bustling city! We started by talking about what it means to be green, and learned about a few sustainable energy sources, including wind, solar, and hydro power. With so many … Continue reading Sustainable Architecture at Spark 2018
At the end of our day, we sat down to remember the biodiverse ecosystem beneath our feet in the soil. We came up with many thoughts and made a mural to depict the biodiversity above and below ground. Many of us decided to include humans, ants, moles, and even mycelium fungal networks living together peacefully.
We drew parallels between Andy Goldsworthy's use of natural elements in sculpture to composers' use of natural sounds in music. After listening to soundscapes of several environments on Monday, we listened to Pierre Schaeffer's Etude des chemins, which creates rhythmic patterns from train noises, and Hugh LeCaine's Dripsody, which is derived from a recording of a drop … Continue reading Music Inspired by Nature
We celebrated our last day of camp with a shadow puppet show using the Balinese-inspired puppets that the kids worked hard on. We gave the kids the settings of Mexico and Jordan (2 places we visited this week) and they came up with the roles and dialogues themselves! Some featured characters: the Storm spirit, the … Continue reading Balinese Shadow Puppet Show
Throughout the week, we have visited the brilliant chinampa farming setup in Mexico, Findhorn ecovillage in Scotland, the Green School in Bali, and the solar tents and desert-turned-food forest in Wadi Rum, Jordan. Along the way, we have learned about a number of sustainable and permaculture practices and how to use natural resources effectively, including … Continue reading Revisiting Efficient Uses of Natural Resources
We got in our bathing suits and played outside with water!
We looked at our mushroom log and discussed the vast fungal network in the earth, and why they are good for the environment. This included the 3 types of mushrooms- Mycorrhiza (beneficial to plants, like chanterelles and truffles), Saprophytic/decomposers (break down organic matter, like shiitake and portobella), and Parasitic (like the honey mushroom). We discovered … Continue reading Caring for our mushroom log and why they are good for the environment
In 1 teaspoon of soil, there can exist up to 4000 species of organisms, such as bacteria, fungi, mites, and other creatures. We spent some time getting to know the marvels of a rotting log and the decomposers who live upon and beneath it. We learned that decomposers are group of organisms that function as … Continue reading Healthy soil – What lives in the ground?
We turned our attention to another Jordanian project: Jordanian-Canadian designer Abeer Seikaly has developed an innovative solar tent for refugees. The tent’s design allows for rainwater collection, solar power generation, solar water heating for showers, ventilation during hot weather, and insulation during cold weather. The tent is made from light-weight “structural fabric” that is designed … Continue reading Art inspired by Jordanian solar tents
Today, Spark Arts Explorers visited the country of Jordan to take a look at some of the permaculture projects there. We first went to the area of Wadi Rum to a site that had once been inhospitable arid desert, but has been transformed into a lush oasis from permaculture practices over a matter of years. … Continue reading Sustainable practices and permaculture in Jordan
