The Edible Schoolyard, Where Students Nurture Their Own Garden

by Jean Saunders, HSC School Wellness Director

On November 5, while most of Chicago was still celebrating that we’d send the next president to Washington, I got up early and got on a plane headed for California. What started out as a long-awaited trip to visit a good friend also turned into an exciting opportunity to pay a visit to a very special school, Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle in Berkeley, California -- home to the Edible Schoolyard.

No doubt many of you are familiar with the Edible Schoolyard or perhaps have even been lucky enough to have visited it for yourself. Taking a tour at Edible (as it is fondly known) has been on my short list of must-see places for a long time!

The mission of the Edible Schoolyard at Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School is to, “ create and sustain an organic garden and landscape that is wholly integrated into the school's curriculum and lunch program. It involves the students in all aspects of farming the garden – along with preparing, serving and eating the food – as a means of awakening their senses and encouraging awareness and appreciation of the transformative values of nourishment, community, and stewardship of the land.” (For more information about their program, be sure to check out Garden Lessons at the Edible Schoolyard website.)

The Edible Schoolyard is made possible in part by funding from the Chez Panisse Foundation, a philanthropic organization founded by Alice Waters, chef at Chez Panisse in Berkeley.

Prior to my visit, I’d read a lot about how the gardening and cooking programs at the Edible Schoolyard are so carefully integrated into the school's curriculum. And, through the cooking in the classroom and gardening projects I’ve been involved with, I’ve seen how powerful it is for students to relate to their academic studies through food and cooking. I just knew I’d be impressed, but I hadn’t expected to have my already high my expectations blown away!

So what blew me away? I think more than anything, it was seeing first-hand the power of this project to engage and inspire not just students, teacher, parents and those directly involved with the project but those from the broader community and really from across the country. 

The folks at the Chez Panisse foundation  describe it so well: “Using food systems as a unifying concept, students learn how to grow, harvest, and prepare nutritious seasonal produce. Experiences in the kitchen and garden foster a better understanding of how the natural world sustains us, and promote the environmental and social well being of our school community.”

This morning, as I look out at the frozen ground that was my front lawn just a few short weeks ago and reflect on what I saw and learned about in Berkeley, I know that there are a host of geographic, climate, economic and policy obstacles that stand in the way of there being an “Edible” at my son's middle school or at the thousands of middle schools across the country. But, if we look at those same obstacles through a lens that recognizes the importance of “using the food system as a unifying concept," I am confident that we can come up with a way to provide all students with similar experiences.   

Comments

[Carlos Meltzer]

I love your post on Edible and love your enthusiasm for the program. I wanted to take a moment to write about some work we are doing in five elementary schools down in Houston, Texas that is along the same lines. Recipe for Success Foundation aims to tackle childhood obesity by introducing children to experiential learning in both Recipe Gardens and Kitchen Classrooms. Through our Chefs in School program (where local chefs adopt a class and teach children to cook healthy meals over the entire school year) and various other programs, we have integrated both gardening and cooking into the daily life of elementary school children.

Over the past two and half years, we have been diligently working in these Title One schools to make healthy foods available to lower income communities and create a model that can be replicated anywhere. In the fall of this year, we plan to begin replicating our work in new schools and community centers in Houston and beyond.

The combination of kids growing and cooking their own food allows children to understand nature, organic gardening and what real fresh food is. Many of the vegetables and herbs grown are incorporated in our cooking lessons thereby reinforcing our seed-to-plate philosophy and the bumper crop has allowed us to start setting up on-campus Farmer's Markets for parents. We also have after school programs and a summer program that reinforce our philosophy while introducing students to new skills and opportunities. The responses from the children have been priceless! They are so excited to participate in our programs and we've been delighted to watch them devour fruits and vegetables that were foreign to them before this.

We love Edible and I am so glad that ideas from the west coast are being integrated to our little coast down south.

I can't wait to hear about more programs like these across America!

[Anne Nagro]

I loved the story on The Edible Schoolyard in Berkeley! Across the country, more and more schools are starting vegetable gardens to teach children healthy eating habits, where food comes from and how to grow their own, science and math, and the values of responsibility, respect and cooperation. I run a school garden share-site called http://www.GardenABCs.com and encourage you to submit information about your school garden project. You'll find grants, links, curricula, programs, events and more. Also, I'm the author of a new children's book, Our Generous Garden, which follows elementary students as they plan, plant and harvest a vegetable garden, eating some and donating 900 pounds to their local food bank. Learn more at http://www.gardenabcs.com/OurGenerousGarden.html. It's received great reviews and is a fun way to introduce gardening to children.

[Organic Vegetable Gardening]

What a fantastic idea! I really do think it is important to get children involved in the garden as it gives them some responsibility as well as the enjoyment of what they can produce.