Farming and Family
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Summary:
In this lesson, students reflect on their personal relationship and their family’s relationships with farming. Students will interview a family member and conduct research into their family's history with growing food. Finally, they will use their answers to develop a creative project.
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Teaching Notes:
- This lesson is a great opportunity to prompt a larger discussion about how students' experiences are situated in the greater context of farming in the United States. Consider extending this lesson by designing a discussion or lesson around the following guiding question:
- How are your own experiences and your family's experiences with farming connected to (or impacted by) laws, patterns, and systems of farming in the United States?
- This lesson asks students to develop a creative project (poem, story, video, art project, college, etc.) based on research. Different students will have varying levels of comfort with engaging in creative work. For some, it may be useful to emphasize that they will not be assessed based on their artistic skill. Instead, this is an opportunity for them to explore the topic of agriculture and farming through a creative lens. Just like having conversations with multiple people about the same topic is bound to yield unique results, so too can investigating an idea or topic through multiple avenues. Encourage them to be curious about how engaging with the topic creatively might shift their perspective or make them aware of ways of looking at it that they hadn’t previously considered.
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This lesson was developed for Edible Schoolyard Project’s Understanding Organic curriculum and is part of the extension inquiries.
