UC teaches kids about food and farming

Mar 23, 2012

Nearly 2,000 third-graders visited the Fresno County fairgrounds March 23 to learn about the connection between the food they eat and their home county's No. 1 economic driver, agriculture.

Farm and Nutrition Day is sponsored by the Fresno County Farm Bureau and the Fresno Fair. UC Cooperative Extension in Fresno County has been involved since the event's inception in 2005; this was the first year for the UC Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center to bring an educational booth to the event.

KARE program and facility coordinator Laura Van Der Staay and her assistant Julie Sievert secured donations of lettuce seedlings, potting soil and pots to give to the children who visited the booth. In addition, Van Der Staay and Sievert used a felt board to teach the children about the benefits of eating right and exercise.

Julie Sievert teaches children about plants.
Julie Sievert teaches children with the felt board.

Laura Van Der Staay, left, helps third-graders plant lettuce seedlings.
Laura Van Der Staay, left, helps third-graders plant lettuce seedlings.

Co-director of UC Cooperative Extension in Fresno County, Shannon Mueller, with children at Farm and Nutrition Day.
Co-director of UC Cooperative Extension in Fresno County, Shannon Mueller, is surrounded by third-graders at Farm and Nutrition Day.

UC Cooperative Extension advisor Richard Molinar shared information about Asian vegetables.
UC Cooperative Extension advisor Richard Molinar shared information about Asian vegetables.

 


By Jeannette E. Warnert
Author - Communications Specialist