October
October 3, 2008
When I started college at the University of Arizona in 1990, I had not decided what my major would be. I had decided what it would not be, though. After years of witnessing my father and his co-workers complaining about the politics of education, I was sure that I would never be a teacher. Two years into core coursework, however, I still had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up, so I went to see an advisor in the Old Main building on campus. I was ushurred into a cubicle where a computer was waiting with a program to set me on the right path. I sat down and answered all the questions and pressed “finished” at the end. The program put all of my information together and told me that I should be… a teacher! NO WAY! That night I sat down and made a list of what I wanted out of a career. I was very honest with myself and this is what I came up with (in order of importance, by the way).
My career needs to provide:
1. Lots of time off
2. Flexibility to live anywhere
3. A feeling of contributing to society
4. Money
(Notice that “money” is on the bottom of the list.) I realized after re-reading what I wrote that I was going to be a teacher. I declared my major the next day and applied to the college of education.
I taught 2nd grade for ten years in Rio Rico. I became pretty good at teaching kids how to read and enjoyed using a hands-on approach to math and science. I quit 2 years ago to work full time on the farm. People often ask me if I will ever return to teaching, but the farm takes too much of my time. Instead, I have brought the kids to me! There is no better classroom than a real working farm.
Stewart started the field trips when our own kids were in primary school eight years ago. I was teaching, so he was on his own. He would go over his lectures with me and ask my advice, but he didn’t really need it – he’s a natural teacher. When Desarae was in first grade, she would take off a few “work” days to help out. She commanded great respect in her red cowgirl hat and matching boots as she showed mesmerized kids all the animals and told them the really important things about each one – like what their names were, where it likes to be scratched and what it likes to eat. Those first years we would have 5 -6 classes a week for the month of October. What a difference! This October we have over 3,000 kids booked for their field trip to the pumpkin patch.
What started out as a fun thing to do for our own kid’s classrooms has evolved into a real program. We now feel a responsibility to teach kids about where their food really comes from. I designed a lesson for just this. I put a pile of “junk” into a box and gather the kids around me in a circle. I ask them if they or their families buy things that come from farms. Usually, only one or two kids raise their hands and describe picking apples or pumpkins. Then I move to the “mystery bag” and pull out it’s contents asking the kids to help sort the I items into two groups – “what came from a farm” and “what didn’t come from a farm”. The first item or two are obvious. I pull out a carrot or a small pumpkin. It’s unanimous - “It came from a farm!” they all agree. Then I get a little sneaky and pull out a loaf of bread, a box of cereal or a pair of blue jeans. Invariably, the 5 year olds sort those items into the “not from a farm pile”. Then I pull out an orange and a carton of orange juice and almost every time one or two insightful minds get it! “Hey, they both come from a farm because orange juice is made from oranges and oranges come from a farm!” (This is why teaching is so much fun!).
This of course leads to some revisions and everything (except, usually, the jeans) gets moved into the “came from a farm pile”. It’s very exciting to see the light bulbs go on. Then, after explaining that cotton grows on a farm and that jeans are made of cotton, I finish the lesson where I started and ask, “How many of your families buy things that come from farms?” The hands shoot up. This group of kids has now realized a very important thing – they all have and use and eat things that came from farms - everyday!
Stewart and I hope that we are contributing to the understanding of the importance of farming. With kids, the knowledge of where food (and blue jeans) comes from is just the beginning of a much bigger idea that our adult “students” learn on their tours of the farm. Our adult groups learn about the need for community sustainability through a local food economy. They learn about eating in season. We try to teach them that maybe watermelons in January isn’t sustainable and that we all have a responsibility in this country to reduce our thirst for fossil fuels and the foods transported by them. We encourage people to make a “3 degree shift”. Big changes in lifestyle are hard to adhere to. Through small changes – like having a salad in January instead of that watermelon, or buying one component of a meal from a local farm per week – big changes are made.
Our farm classroom opens on the 6th of October when our first group of kindergarteners will bounce down our dirt road in a school bus excited about pumpkins and hayrides. Hopefully, they will leave here with a little more than that. Hopefully they will go home at the end of the day and look in their refrigerators and point and say, “That came from a farm. That did, too. So did that. And that…” Through the farm I have brought my education training home. I’m still teaching – in a very different classroom.
Hope we see some locals here for our Fall Festival this October!
Agua Linda Farm is a 63 acre family run farm in Amado Arizona. Go to www.AguaLindaFarm.net for more information or contact Stewart and Laurel Loew at 398-3218 or email stewart@AguaLindaFarm.net. Fall Festival Hours are Saturday and Sunday 10 AM-5 PM all month.
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