In the classroom
Farming for nature: How Nature and Farmers can Help Each Other
‘Farming for Nature: How Nature and Farmers can Help Each Other’ is a short animation that is visual, factual, positive and fun on how farmers can help support nature on their farm to benefit their food production, the quality & fertility of their land, the wildlife it holds and the wider community. It is created for younger children to understand how farming and the nature are intertwined and codependent but is also applicable to a wider audience of farmers, teachers, secondary/university students and anyone with an interest nature, farming and where their food comes from.
Soil: Don’t treat me like dirt workshop
This short workshop is for primary school students who want to learn a bit more about soil – how to identify healthy soils, why healthy soils are important and how we can help soil.. At just over 17 mins long it has a few group and individual pieces of work you can do within.
Top Tip: If you can bring a soil sample to the lesson you can follow the instructions in the video on how to examine healthy soil or even better bring a spade to class or a trowel and check out the soil in the school grounds after the lesson.
Accompanying Worksheet
TAKE ACTION:
Get a knowledgeable parent or local horticulturalist involved in building up a school garden and helping to teach the children to grow on their space
Plant some bulbs or seeds – maybe your teacher could give out mystery seeds or bulbs and you can wait to see what grows
Make a compost heap at home or in school
Start a campaign to get people to stop using pesticides or herbicides in your local community
Collect seaweed for the school garden or grow green manure
Start a wildflower area in your school or encourage your school to take part in the no-mow May project
The Healthy Food Pyramid Leaflet
‘A healthy food pyramid relies on a healthy soil foundation’ is a one page leaflet that may be handy to download, print and hand out to your students and create projects around. This can be downloaded here:
The Healthy Food Pyramid.
You could put this image up on your whiteboard screen and discuss with the class the following points:
- The importance of eating more types of food from the bottom part of the pyramid than the top. Healthier types of food = healthier children.
- That proportions of food should have more from the lower part of pyramid than the upper part of the pyramid. Bigger proportions of the healthier food = healthier children.
- The healthier the soil where this food comes from = healthier children.
- What does healthy soil look like?
- Why is healthy soil good for nature? Healthy soil = more worms, insects, birds etc.
- Why is healthy soil good for the environment? Captures more water = less drought & erosion.
- Why is healthy soil good for the planet? Captures carbon which decreases climate change.
You can download these teachers notes here:
Accompanying Food Pyramid worksheet
If you are interested in learning more, why not start with this resource:
WHAT YOU MIGHT SEE ON A FARM THIS MONTH
More educational and training resources below:
