BGA Soil Day: A Customized Educational Program

On Thursday, December 5th, 2024, Mud Valley Institute hosted a World Soil Day event for a group of local students (aged 12-18) from Brave Generation Academy (BGA). “BGA Soil Day” was a customized educational program developed to expose BGA students to an example of the real-world application of some of the themes and topics they are studying.

The following blog post was written by one of the BGA students to share her experiences at the event.

My name is Sonoma, a 16-year-old student at Brave Generation Academy, which is an international school located in Lagos, Portugal. I attended Mud Valley Institute’s World Soil Day event on December 5th. Myself and a group of my peers went out to Quinta Vale da Lama, just outside of Lagos, to learn about regenerative agriculture, the importance of healthy soil, and to see how the things we learn in our Biology and Chemistry courses can be put into practice in the field.

We started out the day with a tour of the farm. We learned about how animals such as sheep, chickens, and donkeys are moved around to distribute their grazing, as well as the use of their manure to create compost. We also learned that lavender and sage have a symbiotic relationship with beneficial bacteria and fungi in the ground, which is why they are planted in the fruit orchard. I thought the creativity behind these regenerative practices was very interesting. We also got to feed the donkeys, who were very friendly, which was a unique experience. Then, we went on to the market gardens, where we learned about methods of wind blocking to avoid drying out the soil, which is important because it is very windy here in the Algarve. We also got to learn about the cool diversity of fruits grown on the farm. I learned about the existence of the pear-melon, which the other students and I agreed sounded quite delicious. Eventually, we looped back to our starting location, a little bit more educated on the variety of regenerative practices that can be used.

After the farm tour, we rested our legs for a few minutes before jumping into the morning workshops. The first workshop I attended was about water and its effect on soil, even including a little clay landscape model for us to interact with. I also got to clip a rosemary bush, which I thought was pretty satisfying. My favorite workshop was the one about soil. We got to visually analyze different soil samples to determine how healthy they were, and also got to play around with the soil a bit. Both of my hands were entirely caked with dirt, and several people made little clay figures while the workshop teacher, a PhD soil scientist, talked. Afterwards, we went over to the compost bins to learn about worms and how compost is created. There are a surprising amount of ways to create compost, but we mostly focused on the worms and the design of the compost bin. Then we went out to find creatures to observe interacting with the soil. I found a small ant-looking insect with a pointed end, which I had never seen before, and thought that was very cool. All of the workshops were very interactive, so I didn’t feel bored, and I learned a wide variety of things ranging from propagation to worm hotels.

After an uneventful lunch break, we split into three groups for the afternoon. The three available workshops were about composting, working with clay, and soil science. I chose to go with Ms. Elodie, the PhD soil scientist, because I was interested in the scientific process. While we could switch around workshops, I chose to stay in my group because I found it very interesting. We went over to the Soil Lab and learned about some of the equipment within, like the kiln used to heat up and dry out soil samples. I learned how to use a microscope, and got to see all sorts of organic matter inside a sample of soil. Then, we found a patch of soil and performed six different tests on it to measure its quality. I really enjoyed the practicality of it, especially the water absorption test, where we hammered a cylinder into the soil and poured water into it to see how fast it was absorbed by the soil. I also got to hold a big folder that described a bunch of tests that can be run on the soil, which was a bit heavy but also empowering to hold because I felt like a real scientist. We ran these tests for an hour or so until we had to reunite with the other groups before leaving.

It was a pretty long day, but I enjoyed this World Soil Day event more than I thought I would. I was really impressed by the ingenuity that goes into ecosystem regeneration, like using straw to block the ground from wind, and using natural alternatives to donkey food when their usual food doesn’t grow as well in some seasons. I also enjoyed the scientific aspect of the afternoon workshop- I have studied biology in school, so applying it in the field with experiments was very enriching. Overall, I am very happy that I attended this event and am interested in doing other, similar things in the future.

Many thanks to Sonoma for sharing her experience at BGA Soil Day, one of several events we held during our Soil Week 2024. We believe that educating and inspiring youth is a critical part of the work that we do relating to ecosystem restoration, and we will continue to create and offer programs like this in the future.

About BGA Soil Day

BGA learners started with a guided tour of Quinta Vale da Lama, highlighting the different areas of the farm and the regeneration work being done here. Interactive workshops in the morning shared knowledge about and experiences with soil science, water biology and the water cycle, and biodiversity. Additional programs in the afternoon focused on practical application of soil science work, including one program about data collection, monitoring, and analysis of soil health, and one about soil creation and planting of vegetation in healthy soils. These programs let learners “get their hands dirty” out in the field.

🌱 Learn more about our Soil Week 2024