Thank a Farmer

You might have noticed my name change... Children have this uncanny ability to google their teachers and obsess over their personal lives. So from now on my alias is Hymas. Take that, children!!

My lesson plan post today is something near and dear to my heart - Farmers. I received an email from "Agriculture in the Classroom" a week or so ago about this lesson, and jumped on it immediately. If you are not on their mailing list, do it. My 10 year plan is to expand Ag in the Classroom in to Southern Saskatchewan and develop the Alberta Green Certificate program here as well. But more on my aspirations later.

There are many reasons we should thank farmers, here is the main one:

I love these Memes

I randomly brought this lesson in to my class because I didn't care what subject it "fit", I knew it was important and wanted my students to be a part of it. It's the end of harvest, be thankful you have food. I wasn't this blunt with the kids, but pretty close. I added it to the Daily 5 during work on writing, in case you wanted to know.

I opened the lesson with general discussion about what farmers do. My first question was if anyone knew a farmer. A few responses "My grandparents used to farm", "My Uncle is a farmer" blah blah blah. When one of them remembered that I am a farmer, they all raised their hands and thought I was the coolest! These moments are few, so I cherish them. We brainstormed ideas as to what they would write in their thank-you cards, and I wrote these on the board for reinforcement.

I then gave them a little quiz. Honestly, this was mostly for my enjoyment. Their answers were hilarious and the general ignorance about farming practices is always good for a laugh. Of course, we discussed the quiz once all the student's were finished and hopefully enlightened them about farming practices right here in Saskatchewan.

The students were then given a piece of yellow paper and sent on their way. Here are some examples of their work (I covered their names, obviously):

Thats a Hereford, in case anyone was wondering

The student's were all very engaged, and willing to write their thank-you cards. Not like they had an option of writing the thank-you card, but engaged non the less. 

You can download the lesson and quiz directly from the AITC website found here, the lesson is called "Salute to Saskatchewan Farmers"and they are collecting thank-you cards until November 9th to be send out this year. So get on it! 

Until next time, here is some cat humor to get you through the day: