Fourth and fifth grade students from St. James-Holy Redeemer Elementary School recently toured The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens, where they learned about adaptations allowing plants to thrive in desert-like environments.

Through observation in the Desert Garden, students learned how plants’ color, shape and surface texture can be adaptive and to predict how plant forms help them function.

Fourth grade teacher Kellie Insalaco especially appreciated that the real world interactive learning experience was tied to the California and Common Core Standards. Fifth grade teacher Maureen Moran noted that field trips like this allow students to engage in their learning through testing their hypothesis via experimentation and help bring studies to life.

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