At Kahakai Elementary School in Kailua, Kona, math and science are sometimes learned in a garden where kindergartners create growth charts from data they have collected and older students make analyses and draw conclusions.

As part of the project, students took a field trip to a working farm in Waimea where they saw and tasted vegetables they never heard of, said school principal Jessica Yamasawa.

And they don't only learn from the garden, they use it for service projects such as preparing food grown there and feeding it to the needy, Yamasawa said.

"If we want society to grow in a positive way we have to take these actions and the children want to engage in them," she said, adding that the garden is a way to make public education relevant. "We are already studying math and science but if you cannot engage the children, then you lose that opportunity to get them to really learn what you want them to learn. And if you do things that allow the whole body to get involved, they're more willing. It's exciting."

The garden evolved through a federal grant that supports hands-on math and science activities, Yamasawa said. The project started small, but as children saw other students working, producing and eating from the garden they begged to participate. Now, after two years, the whole school is involved and every class has at least one of the 37, 4-foot-by-8-foot raised plots, she said.

The kindergartners compare the growth of their plants to their height, learning perspective without even trying, and older students have laptop computers to store their data for graphs and other projects, Yamasawa said.

The demonstration project was supported by the Kona Young Farmers — average age 75 — who worked with part-time teacher Leona Kassel to build and prepare the garden plots, Yamasawa said. The Kona Outdoor Circle supported the garden with a grant.

The idea to create the learning garden grew from Yamasawa's own childhood experience of partnering with an older child at Koloa Elementary School on Kaua'i and growing a sunflower, she said.

"The delight of my young life was watching this plant grow from a seed, " Yamasawa said. "I remember standing and looking up at this big sunflower head bursting forth. It was one of my favorite memories."

The garden engages the students, making them enthusiastic about learning and coming to school, Yamasawa said.