Farm to School Link Roundup

Sometimes you need a little Farm to School inspiration from around web! So take a break from your busy day and enjoy these interesting articles, videos or photos!

We are loving this blog post about cooking with kids from Liz Neumark of Great Performances. Our favorite tip: "get messy, make mistakes" While this is technically a line of Miss Frizzle's from the Magic School Bus, Liz goes on to remind us that "Cooking is following recipes but it is also about creativity. Try new combinations, new ingredients. The more you experiment, the better and more confident you will be."

David W. Orr from the Center for Ecoliteracy advises that "The classroom is the ecology of the surrounding community, not the confining four walls of the traditional school...[Where] they discover what Rachel Carson once called the 'sense of wonder'."

In this Boston Globe article,Tony Geraci (aka Cafeteria Man) describes his fight for healthier school food in Baltimore, MD and Memphis, TN. He emphasizes that "Food is one of the tools that ensures that kids are going to learn. Kids who are hungry do not learn."

Mark Bittman is Rethinking the word 'Foodie' in the New York Times.

Content provided by Karyn Novakowski, Project Director, Somerville Farm to School Project

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Mindful Eating: Part 1

In order to digest your food properly, your body must be in parasympathetic mode, or in a state of non-stress. Kindergartners know this. Well, they might not know the scientific term yet, but during lunch they participate in 6 minutes of silence; a period they call "Mindful Eating". When asked why they like mindful eating, the children replied, because "it’s quiet”, “I can enjoy my food better”, “I get peace and quiet”, and "it’s calmly”. Kindergartener teacher Ms. Scrima, and other Kennedy School teachers have been implementing mindfulness in the cafeteria and their classrooms since last year. They are proud to have a lunch period that looks and sounds quite different from the chaotic cafeteria rush other classes often experience. While the students sit silently at the lunch table checking in with their emotions, their digestive systems are also benefitting. Physiologically, only when our bodies are in rest mode can the brain trigger the release of digestive ...

Put your best FORK forward during National Nutrition Month

March is National Nutrition Month! Each year the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics develops new topics to celebrate National Nutrition Month. This year's theme, Put your best fork forward, encourages us to consider that every bite counts. Even "small shifts in our food choices, can add up over time." Here in Somerville we are celebrating National Nutrition Month in a few ways. ~ We are releasing Veggie of the Month kits in each school's library! The kits contain books, taste testing supplies, and a binder with lesson materials for each month! ~ We are visiting a few PreK-2nd grade classes to "taste-test" the veggie of the month: leafy greens! In the classroom, we are reading Sylvia's Spinach and making a simple salad dressing to drizzle over spinach! (Be sure to check back later for the results of our visits!) ~ Our Wellness Champions and Farm to School Staff are posting bulletin boards and fliers around the schools! ...

How do we get kids to eat their leafy greens? Try these 2 recipes...

For this year's National Nutrition Month, we are "Going Further with Food!" It's an assumption that getting our kids to eat their leafy greens is always a colossal battle. It's true--salads aren't easy to convince a kid to try when they're staring at something that resembles rabbit food. But by assuming they won't try it means you've already given up, and that's not what we're about here at the Somerville Farm to School Project! So how do we make salads desirable? For one, we can provide a space for children to grow their own food, to learn the parts of a plant, and to nurture something from seed to harvest. We've learned that, "if they grow it, they'll eat it". It's empowering to be hands-on with food! Even if you don't have outdoor garden space, leafy greens are easy to grow indoors or in small pots as long as you have a sunny window or space. Secondly, you can involve kids in the kitchen by making fun salad ...

Somerville Farm to School Project

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