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Mini Grant Winners 1999
April 1999 Mini-Grants
September 1999 Mini-Grants
November 1999 Mini-Grants
- Grant 1 Introduction to Agriculture Education Through Heritage Farm Coast Tours
The purpose of the MAC, Inc. grant is to actively institute a working and continuing curriculum concerning agriculture and the obstacles facing the working farmer in Massachusetts. Once this curriculum is developed it will be put into action within the New Bedford, Massachusetts public school system in cooperation with Mrs. Maryann Kilgour, New Bedford's school director of curriculum. The first part of the project will be to educate New Bedford's teachers to the agricultural issues facing the present day farmer by having the educators participate in working Heritage Farm Coast Tours. These tours will provide teachers with needed professional development points and also acquire their input about how they think an agriculture curriculum should be developed for their grade level. The cost of the project is unknown at this time, but the $1,500 will be used as "seed" money to get the project up and operating so that an agricultural and farming based curriculum can be developed and instituted with input from all project participants.
Contact: Stephen L. Worden, CEC 152 Hudson Street New Bedford, MA 02744
Project Duration: May 1999 through November 1999.
Mini-Grant Award: $1,500
- Grant 2" Using the Cranberry Bog as a Classroom: An Interdisciplinary Approach
"Using the Cranberry Bog as a Classroom Lab" will be designed to introduce 5th graders at the Butler Middle School, Lowell to the science of a working cranberry bog. It will become a living classroom as the students study the ecosystem of the cranberry bog. They will study how weather effects the growing cycle of cranberries. Students will study water; its use and control through dikes and dams. They will study the role of pesticides in the environment. Finally, they will investigate the geology of the area. Students will make two visits to the bog, once in the fall to see the harvest and again in the spring. Students will take water samples during their two visits and learn how to make slides and use a microscope. They will keep a scientific notebook and log their observations during both field trips to the bog and classroom experiments. Students will be evaluated on their notebooks and a video will be recorded.
Contact: Susan Lippmann & Susan Bassler Pickford (The 5th Grade Team) B.F. Butler Middle School 1140 Gorham Street Lowell, MA 01852
Project Duration: September 1999 through Spring 2000
Mini-Grant Award: $850
- Grant 3 From Egg to Chick to Chicken to Egg...
The "From Egg to Chick to Chicken to Egg..." project is a multi-disciplinary, hands on learning project that focuses on the life cycle of chickens. This project has been piloted for the last two years on a small scale and has produced a great deal of interest in the building. With increased funding we will reach all students in the fifth and sixth grades. The goal is to fully integrate this into the science and language arts curriculums. This program will be operating on a small scale this year and funds will be used to purchase more incubators and brooders for this and future years.
Contact: John King Edith Nourse Rogers School 43 Highland Street Lowell, MA 01852
Project Duration: Spring of 1999 and used year after year
Mini-Grant Award: $1,492
- Grant 4 Birch Meadow School Nature Science Center
The Nature Science Center project consists of the creation of a working outdoor garden and science center in a courtyard of the school. The purpose of this project is to provide meaningful hands-on learning experiences for the 600 Birch Meadow K-5 students and their teachers. After examining the various strands of the science curriculum frameworks and the areas covered by the Reading Public Schools elementary science curriculum, the need for more inquiry-based and hands-on learning experiences has been recognized. A nature center has the potential to provide many opportunities for active learning in the area of the life sciences
Contact: Richard Davidson, Principal Birch Meadow School 27 Arthur B. Lord Drive Reading, MA 01867
Project Duration: 1999-2000 school year Audience: 600 students in grades K-5 and their teachers.
Mini-Grant Award: $1,500
- Grant 5 Agricultural Learning Barn
The "Agricultural Learning Barn" will be an eye-catching replica of a real barn which will contain factual agricultural information for Berkshire County Elementary Schools. The primary emphasis will be on local and Massachusetts agriculture. It will also create an agricultural resource for teachers and connect farmers and farms with schools. Implemented by Ioka Valley farm in conjunction with Berkshire County farm Bureau. The intent will be to leave the Barn set-up at a school, preferably in the library area, from two to four weeks. While at the school, we expect the librarian will use the materials to introduce the children to agriculture, with teacher following up with classroom lessons and activities.
Contact: Judy C. Leab, Ioka Valley Farm 3475 Main Street P.O. Box 1045 Hancock, MA 01237
Project Duration: June 1999 and to be completed by September 1st, 1999
Mini-Grant Award: $1,500.
- Grant 6 Global Mosaic Garden
Students have planned, developed and maintained several garden sites at Burncoat High School. Currently there are two perennial gardens, a landscape lab, courtyard garden that includes two water gardens. At this time there is no area for vegetables, herbs, annuals or cut flowers. This project will involve all horticulture students in grades 9-12 in growing and harvesting herbs, vegetables and flowers at the school.
Contact: Brenda Helleberg Burncoat High School 179 Burncoat Street Worcester, MA 01606
Project Duration: April 1999 through October 1999
Mini-Grant Award: $482
2nd Cycle (September 1999)
I am requesting the MAC Mini-Grant to fund my proposal to research, design and construct a teaching packet for elementary school teachers about the farming of apples. The packet will be an integrated mini-unit (about two weeks) including language arts, social studies, math, art and health lessons and activities. Apples will be the vehicle through which students will learn about and develop a better understanding of agriculture and the complex process of bringing food to the table in today's world. The unit will be piloted with his class and that of his colleagues and a complete packet will be ready by the year 2,000. The packet will be available to New England Teachers through the New England McIntosh Growers Assn.
Contact: Noel Kurtz Crocker Farm Elementary School West Street Amherst, MA 01002
Project Duration: Started in spring of 1999-2000 school year
Mini-Grant Award: $1,500
- Grant 2 Farms, Markets and the Distribution of Produce
The title of this proposed project is Farms, Markets and the Distribution of Produce. Through this curriculum children will understand the process that produce goes through to get to the grocery stores around our community, as well as develop an appreciation for the people and the jobs that are "behind the scenes". The teachers began to pilot the curriculum last year as part of the Social Studies unit and will continue to develop and implement this curriculum for their first grade students.
Contact: Sara Musso & Hildi Perez, 1st Grade Teachers, Young Achievers Science & Mathematics 25 Walk Hill Street Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
Project Duration: September through December 1999
Mini-Grant Award: $1,400
- Grant 3 Nabnasset Indoor Gardening Project
The Nabnasset school has 600 kindergarten through second grade students. This project will provide artificial light carts to extend our successful outdoor gardening curriculum through the winter. Students will propagate stem and leaf cuttings, force bulbs and germinate seeds. The project meets the requirements created by the Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks ( Science Characteristics of Organisms, Strand 2 Domains of Science - Life Science). The Nabnasset principal will direct this project and the teachers will develop the curriculum. Students will learn activities required to bring products to market. Children will learn that technology, such as artificial lights, can extend the growing season for farmers of the 21st century. The PTA and Millipore Foundation are co-sponsors.
Contact: Diane Brogan Nabnaset Elementary School, Plain Road Westford, MA 01886.
Project Duration: September, 1999 through June 2000
Mini-Grant Award: $500
This project brings 300 second- grade students in the Middleborough Public Schools to the Soule Homestead Education center, a non-profit educational farm in Middleborough, for three visits, in fall, winter and spring to learn about organic farming, farm animals, the history of land use in their community and agroecology through hands-on activities such as making compost, preparing garden beds for winter, searching for seeds to save, spinning, making butter, feeding chickens, planting, playing educational games and harvesting crops. This project teachers children about agriculture as an industry that uses and provides resources and about some of the principles of sustainable agriculture and is therefore consistent with MAC's goals. Since Middleborough is one of the fastest growing regions in the state at the present time and farmland is disappearing rapidly, it is vital that local children have access to programs that introduce them to the source of their food, fiber and other needs and give them a connection to the earth.
Contact: Karen Dusek The Soule Homestead Education Center 46 Soule Street Middleborough, MA 02346 (508) 947-6744
Project Duration: Fall of 1999 through spring of 2000
Mini-Grant Award: $540
3rd Cycle (November 1999)
The town of Warwick at one time was a large agricultural community. Farms dotted the landscape and the mills often associated with these farms also were found along the rivers and streams. The project would encourage the children to take a look back at the history of farming in Warwick and the Pioneer Valley. In years gone by, there were hundreds of farms and pastures, now the only way to identify many of these is by the abandoned stone walls seen along the roads and highways. The children's project would be to try to trace back and identify where many of these farms used to be. They will create a diorama of 3 dimensional map of Warwick from topographical maps and old records, and will use books, computers and other reference materials to gather information on the history of farming in the area.
Contact: Wallace McCloud, Principal, Warwick Community School 41 Winchester Road Warwick, MA 01378
Project Duration: Started in winter 2000 through summer 2000
Mini-Grant Award: $1,250
- Grant 2 Nutrition and Local Agriculture Education
This program focuses on nutrition and Massachusetts grown food products. The objectives are to teach school children about maintaining a healthy diet and good nutrition as related to current dietary guidelines and the Food Guide Pyramid, to familiarize children with what foods are grown and produced in Massachusetts and how they get from farm to table, and to take children to local farms to experience life on the farm and see how various foods are grown and produced. The program supports the Massachusetts curriculum frameworks in natural science and health. They are asking for money to take students from the Fuller School, Holland School and P.J. Kennedy School to Araujo Farm, Allendale Farm and Wilson Farm.
Contact: Kirsten Johnson and Melinda Miffit UMass Extension of Greater Boston P.O. Box 1196 Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
Project Duration: October 1999 through June 2000
Mini-Grant Award: $1,500
- Grant 3 Project GROW Garden Right Outside Window
This project was inspired by a need to beautify the front entrance area of the Clyde F. Brown School. We hope to build a raised rectangular garden, four feet by thirty-six feet, which will include shrubs, perennials, a birdbath and stone markers. The project will be a hands-on learning experience for the entire fourth grade class. Objectives include: an awareness of the planning involved in preparing a garden, the need to design a plant area that will allow for the most beneficial plant growth, ability to select plants that will survive in this environment as well as beautify the area, and the personal involvement by many students in an agriculture project of a permanent nature that will be an asset to this school and their community.
Contact: Pat Kearney Grade Four Teacher Clyde F. Brown School Park Road Millis, MA 02054
Project Duration: September, 1999 through June 2000
Mini-Grant Award: $500.
- Grant 4: The School Street Beautification Project
The School Street School Beautification Project will engage youth from several after school programs in a community service learning activity focused on the beautification of the grounds of the School Street School ( c. 1896), an historic municipal building in Taunton, MA. Members of the Taunton Youth Council (ages 15 - 17) and the Youth-In-Action Program (ages 9-12) will first learn about the ecology of the site and basic elements of horticulture. They will also learn about landscape design and create their own design, with feedback from building occupants and other city officials. They will then implement the landscaping project at the School Street School site. The youth will receive education and technical assistance from Darlene Araujo of Araujo Farms. Funds will be utilized for both the educational component and the purchase of ornamental organic materials. Includes a tour to Araujo Farm to learn more about agriculture first hand
Contact: Karen Guillette, Project Manager, The Mayor's Office of Community Development 45 School Street Taunton, MA 02780
Project Duration: late winter/early spring 2000 through fall 2000
Mini-Grant Award: $1,000
For more information about Massachusetts Agriculture in the Classroom or our programs:
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Massachusetts Agriculture in the Classroom
P.O. Box 345
Seekonk, MA 02771
(508) 336-4426 Fax: (508) 336-0682
www.aginclassroom.org
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