Grow some agricultural literacy on Alaska Ag Day

Alaska is greening up again. Gardens and fields will be planted and soon the farmers’ markets will open.

We celebrate Alaska Agriculture Day today in recognition of another year’s preparations to plant and eventually harvest.

Growing and gardening are becoming very popular topics in Washington, D.C., where I was last week for a National Agriculture in the Classroom Consortium meeting.

First Lady Michelle Obama and her daughters have a White House organic kitchen garden, the first vegetable garden planted there since Eleanor Roosevelt’s victory garden during World War II. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack reportedly wants a meaningful garden (“not just a few flowers,” said one USDA representative) at every USDA facility — from USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service to Rural Development.

Call it the greening of America.

Many of our local schools are using gardening as a learning tool, despite the fact it can be tough when most of the growing season is outside the school year. At Shaw Elementary between Palmer and Wasilla, Karen Doyle’s class grew flowers to sell on Alaska Ag Day. Butte and Sherrod elementary schools are among those local schools with full-fledged gardens, and both schools will make these gardens centerpieces of special May agriculture events.

Teachers will tell you that once a child gets his or her hands dirty growing a potato or a pansy, something magic happens. The process of raising anything from seed to table gives students both a great learning experience and a sense of accomplishment. Science literally comes alive. With the teachers using everything from math skills (like graphing and estimating), writing skills (journaling) and nutrition information to round out the lessons, the planted seed grows a bounty of learning.

Not all schools have gardens. Greenhouses are expensive and finding volunteers to tend the gardens in the summer can be difficult. If there is a garden or an interest in a school garden at your local school, Alaska Agriculture Day is a good prompt to volunteer to be part of the effort.

Even without gardens, students can get a new appreciation for their food with an introduction to agriculture. And that’s where the Agriculture in the Classroom program comes in.

On Tuesday, classes around the state will have guest readers/presenters who will share information on agriculture through the Alaska AITC Alaska Ag Day Literacy Project.

Several Palmer FFA students have designed lesson plans for students, and will be presenting at Sherrod Elementary in Palmer and Snowshoe Elementary in Wasilla. It’s a long-time program sponsored by the Northland Pioneer Grange. The students’ lessons include “Beneficial Insects,” “Bees” and “Agriculture: Your Bread and Butter.”

Swanson Elementary kindergarten teacher Patrick Robinson turned his classroom into a farm scene this spring. At Larson Elementary, his wife, Dawn Robinson, has her own spin on Alaska Ag Day. Her kindergarten class is doing the farming behind Cinco de Mayo foods — flour tortillas in a Ziploc bag, and using Matanuska Creamery for cheese for quesadillas.

Because May 5 is the Mexican celebration as well as Alaska Ag Day, many of the readers around the state will be using the book “The Tortilla Factory” by Gary Paulsen, who visited Mat-Su libraries over the weekend.

Agricultural literacy — learning the sources of our food, fabric, flowers and even some fuel — has gained impetus with an increased interest in local foods and food safety.

To help teachers help their students become more agriculturally literate, Alaska AITC is offering two educator institutes this summer. The first Alaska AITC Educator Institute in Fairbanks will be held June 2-4; the third annual institute will be Aug. 4-6 in Palmer. Both offer one or two professional development credits. The courses are made possible by an Alaska Grown grant from the Alaska Division of Agriculture.

For more information on the Alaska Agriculture in the Classroom program, national AITC resources or the Alaska AITC Educator Institutes, visit www.agclassroom.org/ak, e-mail akaitc@alaskafb.org or call 982-2219. Alaska AITC is a program of the Alaska Farm Bureau.

Victoria Naegele (akaitc@laskafb.org) is director of Alaska Agriculture in the Classroom. She lives near Palmer .