The Bartow County School System nutrition department is finding creative ways to educate GA students about where their food comes from. With weekly ‘Takeover Tuesday’ lessons, they’re working to engage students on everything from taking care of chickens to learning about pollinators and edible gardens.
“Each week at a different school, the nutrition department hosts ‘Takeover Tuesday’ events where we participate in educational lessons and enhance the farm-to-school experience for the students,” said Jessica Chandler, School Nutrition Program Specialist for Bartow County School System.
One week, the nutrition team worked with STEM classes at Hamilton Crossing Elementary School on kitchen math while making homemade lemonade. They learned how to safely handle the fruit and proper storage as well as measurement techniques of dry ingredients.
“Most of our nutrition staff is multi-generational within the community. They love going into classrooms where either they attended school or worked when the teachers were students,” said Chandler.
Second-grade students at White Elementary School had a “dill-icious” day for their ‘Takeover Tuesday’. As part of their class lesson about the life cycle of a plant, students helped harvest cucumbers grown in the school’s garden, then prepped the cucumbers and made a cucumber salad as a snack with their lunch.
The district is also expanding its school gardens in hopes that each of its 19 schools will soon have one. The goal is to add additional crops to those already grown including watermelons, radishes and carrots. At Euharlee Elementary School, students transplanted pepper seedlings into pots that were planted in a pollinator garden. Among the flowers – they often find butterflies and bees buzzing around the garden. Students help to harvest the peppers to be used in school lunches for what the nutrition team is calling pepperpalozza. Student-created recipes are served at lunch, with a winning school determined by the most creative recipe.
“We are looking to plant a pizza or salsa garden to let the students grow the ingredients for a pizza or salsa,” said Katie McAllister, a teacher for Bartow County School System. “We are also looking into planting a vegetable bed with cool weather crops.”
Sustainability is a big part of the nutrition team’s ‘Takeover Tuesday’ experience for students to ensure that waste generated is properly recycled back into the environment. The district hosts chicken clubs at five schools to support that initiative.
Instead of throwing it out, the uneaten food is collected and used as food for the birds. At Pine Log Elementary School, four hens in the chicken coop are part of STEM lessons. Students help collect the eggs and track egg laying by recording which nest box the eggs are found in.
For the first time this year, eggs collected from the chickens were used in school meals. To make that happen, four teachers in the district became certified egg candlers and students helped collect the eggs. Students assisted the nutrition team in preparing a quiche with them, helped to serve the dish to classmates and then took all the food scraps back to the chicken coop for composting.
Bartow County School System is planning to bring chicken coops to all of its schools by next school year. The district is certifying at least one staff member at each school as an egg candler so schools can serve the eggs and sell some of the eggs to raise money for their chickens and garden programs.
The district views its school gardens as living classrooms, offering a place where students can actively participate in growing fresh produce. To bring more school-grown produce to the district, hydroponic lettuce growing is coming to all 19 schools this year.
To enhance the farm-to-school program, the nutrition team also works with area farms to provide additional fresh fruits and vegetables for student breakfasts and lunches. They were awarded a grant from the USDA as part of its Fresh Fruits and Vegetables Program (FFVP), so they can introduce elementary school children to a variety of produce that they otherwise might not have the opportunity to sample.
