Living Root Garden School • Soil & the Underground • Name: ______________________
🔍 The Case
The case of the vanishing scraps — a banana peel went into a box and came out as black gold. Who ate it, and how does the box work?
A good bin is a dark, opaque plastic tote, about 10 to 20 gallons, with a snap-on lid — dark, because worms are photophobic, which means light is lava to them. They breathe through their skin, and bright light dries it out.
The bin needs holes: about a dozen pencil-width drainage holes in the bottom, and air holes around the upper sides and in the lid. Worms breathe through their skin, so a sealed tote is a suffocation chamber.
Bedding is the damp, fluffy stuff that fills two-thirds of the bin — shredded newspaper, torn cardboard, or coconut coir. Soak it, then squeeze it like a wrung-out sponge: damp all the way through, only a drop or two coming out. That is the sweet spot.
Rule out the wrong worms: the big earthworms in your yard are deep burrowers that would spend all day trying to tunnel out. The bin crew is red wigglers, small and reddish-brown, or African nightcrawlers, bigger and built for Florida heat. A healthy bin smells like a forest after rain — if it smells like rotten eggs or vinegar, something is wrong.
Ask: Will scraps buried under bedding disappear faster than scraps left sitting on top? Write your guess before you start.
Try: Build your bin and bury one small handful of scraps under the bedding, then leave one small piece sitting on top. Check both spots after a week and write down what vanished and what is still there.
Stretch (Teens & Growers ready for more): Do the bin math: a worm eats about half its body weight in food a day, and a starter bin holds about a pound of worms. Work out how many worms would handle your household's weekly scraps, and how big a bin that needs.
Tell: Fill in the log below — date, what you fed, what the bin smelled like — then finish this sentence in words or a labeled drawing: “The buried scraps ___ because ___.”
Date
What I saw
What surprised me
Date: ____/____/____
Date: ____/____/____
Date: ____/____/____
Date: ____/____/____
🛠️ Build It
Draw your dream worm bin from the side, cut open like a dollhouse, with every part labeled.
🗣️ Be the Teacher
Show someone your bin drawing and tell them why the bin has to stay dark, damp, and full of air — in your own words, no reading off the packet.
🏅 I can…
☐ I can build a worm bin that smells like a forest.
Portfolio check
☐ Guide read
☐ Case solved
☐ Ask, Try, Tell done
☐ Build It filed: Blueprint + feeding calendar
☐ Taught someone
☐ Badge earned: I can build a worm bin that smells like a forest.
Living Root Garden School • livingrootgarden.com/homeschool/ • Free — print as many copies as you like. File this sheet with your portfolio log. Sprouts do the Read, the Case, and Build It; Growers try the Ask, Try, Tell stretch when ready; Teens do the whole packet — including teaching it back.