*make sure to click "View entire message" to get access to the full newsletter!* |
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And thank you to all beekeepers who volunteered to read and everyone else who volunteered to make this program so successful!
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Pictured above: Principal Maggie Adams from Day Mountain Regional Middle School (and also owner of Freeman Beeman) reading to Kingfield Elementary School's Kindergarten and Grade 1 Classes. She also brought in things to show and tell about beekeeping! |
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Summer Teacher's Institute 2023 |
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Register Today for the Maine Agriculture in the Classroom Summer Teacher's Institute!
Join us this year at the University of Maine at Presque Isle from July 31 - August 4, 2023. 28 Contact Hours or 2.8 CEU’s. Scholarships are available! Space is limited so register early! Learn more on our website!
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A beautiful overview of the Southern Aroostook County Agricultural Museum, with drone footage by Yoon S Byun. Produced by the Maine Community Foundation. |
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Our weeklong Summer Teacher's Institute includes two full days of touring farms and agri-businesses. Check out some of the stops we have planned for this year:
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Workshop: Building Inclusive Food Education Practices |
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Food-based education can be a meaningful and engaging modality that builds health & resiliency skills while meeting core content and curriculum needs. However, food and land are also deeply entwined in historical and current trauma, oppression, and cultural context. Through time for reflection and facilitated small group discussion this interactive workshop will introduce a tool that can help you reduce unintentional harm, and elevate your awareness of how to be inclusive of a diverse set of backgrounds and lived experiences in your farm to school implementation work. This workshop is put on by the Maine Farm to School Network Equity Committee and Equity Consulting & Education Firm.
Date & Time: Tuesday May 16th, 2023, 3pm
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Maine School Garden Day - REGISTRATION DEADLINE! |
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The deadline to register is May 5th!!!
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Keynote Talk: Building Communities in Garden Settings - Katey Branch, Alan Day Community Gardens
Choice of 3 Workshops:
Bees - Dr. Phil Fanning, University of Maine
Pollinators - Laurie Bowen, UMaine Cooperative Extension
Soil Health and Diversity - Michael Ward, Ward Land and Ranch Restoration
Rainwater Harvesting and Irrigation - Maggie Blumenthal, Etna Dixmont Elementary & Ryan Parker, FoodCorps
Working with Native Plants - Nell Houde, Wild Seed Project
Plus tours of the grounds and networking with school gardeners!
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Maine Farm & Sea to School Institute: Teams Announced! |
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Maine's 2nd Annual Farm & Sea to School Institute
Congratulations to the 2023-2024 MFSTS Institute Teams!
RSU 12
RSU 71
Stratton School
West Bath Elementary
Lawrence Jr/Sr High School
The Ecology Learning Center
The Maine Farm & Sea to School Institute is a year-long professional program for school food system change.
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Maine Nutrition Council Annual Conference |
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Join us for a hands-on educational event like no other! The conference will include themes of holistic and herbal medicine, sustainable agriculture, homesteading, benefits of eating locally and in-season, and farm to institution. This event awards 6 CPE/CEU credits and contact hours.
The conference will include exhibiting organizations and vendors, presentations and question/answer/discussion sessions, cooking demos (with taste testing, of course!), and the afternoon allotted to garden tours and learning about FSD's efforts in a student and staff engaged, nutrition and agriculture integrated system where they truly are farm to table (school-operated-farm to cafeteria-table, that is.)
PIZZA NIGHT IN THE GARDENS
Looking for 2 additional CPE/CEU credits and contact hours? Come early the night before the conference at no additional cost! Join us from 6-8pm in FSD's garden for a Pizza Night where we will be making pizzas in the wood-fired oven using ingredients picked right from the garden! Pizza Night has limited availability, only 25 tickets are available and are on first come, first serve basis. Upon registration to the conference, there will be an area to RSVP to this pre-conference event.
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Harvest of the Month - May is Maine Wild Blueberries! |
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Click here for the great Harvest of the Month (HOM) materials - posters, fact sheets, recipes, social media promo, and more!
All of our HOM Resource Pages can be found on our Teach ME site under "Teaching Units"
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Teacher Resources Section |
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Lessons - This Month's Highlight: Ag Careers!
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Agriculture Pays. Grades K-2. Students discover that agricultural careers are interconnected and that agriculture influences many parts of their daily lives.
Find Your Future Ag Career. Grades 3-5. Students discover the variety of agricultural careers available and consider their career paths in terms of economics, interests, and suitability to their personal talents and characteristics.
Charting Agricultural Careers. Grades 6-8. Students will use infographics and charts to explore the careers that produce food, clothing, shelter, and fuel along with a variety of agricultural STEM careers requiring critical thinkers and problem solvers.
Career Gaming. Grades 6-8. Through project-based learning, students will design games that will assist others with identifying a variety of agricultural careers, possible emerging agricultural careers, the education required for agricultural career options, and the types of salaries that can be expected in each career.
When I Grow Up: Discover Ag Careers Curriculum. Grades 6-8. This kit has been designed so you can easily incorporate this information into your curriculum in an interdisciplinary manner. The lessons and activities included in this kit have been crafted with your middle school students in mind. We hope they find these experiential lessons to be both engaging and meaningful!
Growing Aspirations Lessons. Grades 6-12. These lessons feature activities aimed to help youth identify and develop habits of mind, learn about the multi-faceted Maine Food System, and develop career aspirations and identify training and education pathways for reaching their goals.
Another May Lesson Highlight:
Live. Love. Eat Plants! Grades K-6. Lesson 9 from the Healthy Kids Happy Planet Curriculum, recommended for May, honoring Cinco de Mayo & Mexican Pride. Cool Bean & Cultural Connection: PINTO Bean & Mexico-Cinco de Mayo. Nutrition Focus: Brain (mental) Health, Healthy Fats & Circulatory System. Fun and engaging worksheets, with recipes!
Looking for more? Explore the Agricultural Literacy Curriculum Matrix HERE
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National FFA AgExplorer. AgExplorer is a comprehensive career resource to help you explore the broad range of careers within the industry of agriculture. The industry of agriculture can open up a world of possibilities, and the demand for professionals in every agricultural area is high. Learn more about which career might be right for you by watching the videos, exploring the career pages, and completing the Career Finder interactive quiz.
How Many Hats Does a Farmer Wear? This elementary activity illustrates the wide array of career paths available in agriculture. Students will create a paper "pinwheel" illustration of the many hats that farmers wear.
Careers in Agriculture Module. This module touches on educating students about the hundreds of jobs within the agriculture industry and the importance that they have on our daily lives. It also goes on to teach how students can go on to be involved in agriculture themselves.
Field to Film Career Snapshots. Explore more than 20 agriculture-related careers with these "snapshot" videos. The video playlist features careers on the farm as well as many others in sales, technology, education, and more.
Careers in Agriculture. A secondary level e-book designed as a guide for students and young people considering their career opportunities by presenting them with a current, in-depth, thorough, and real view of the agricultural industry. Each page is equipped with interactive links to videos, further reading, and more.
Adventures in Agriculture Coloring Book. Get a glimpse inside some of the STEM career paths available in agriculture and see women in STEM. Edition 1 is available in English, Spanish, French, and Portuguese. Edition 2 is available in English and Spanish.
Kit: Living Science Careers Equipment Bags. This is a great resource to help your students better understand the exciting and diverse array of STEM employment opportunities in food, agriculture, and natural resources. Each kit comes with yarn, signs, and seven Living Science Careers Equipment Bags, all in a sturdy plastic storage container. Order this kit online from agclassroomstore.com.
Kit: Planet Zorcon. This interactive group activity will help your students understand the limited resources available for consumption on earth. Students will work in groups to explore the connection between individual behavior and resource use, explain the differences between renewable and nonrenewable resources, and identify careers related to natural resource management. Order this kit online from agclassroomstore.com.
Career Trek Game. Career Trek is an interactive game for up to four players. The object of the game is for students to be able to name 10 careers in agriculture and natural resources. The kit includes 10 game boards for a classroom of 40 middle school students. Order this game online from agclassroomstore.com.
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More funding opportunities are listed from some of our friends:
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ReTreeUS plants orchards in schools and provides educational programs that empower people to be healthy environmental stewards.
Fuel Up to Play 60 offers educators a wide array of resources they can use to help students make sustainable changes in their school environment.
Agroworld is an agricultural science e-zine developed for the secondary educator.
KidsGardening has ideas about plants and gardens, teacher resources, and grant opportunities.
The Chop Chop magazine and website has easy and healthy recipes.
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This document is a compilation of agriculture related resources to be used in virtual and remote learning.
Pictures, videos, and words are hyperlinked throughout the document.
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Funding from this plate has impacted up to 200,000 students annually with lessons, materials, volunteers and teacher training. Annually up to $60K is distributed in grants to schools, FFA, 4-H and other Non-profit programs for Ag education initiatives by the Maine Agriculture in the Classroom Council.
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Donate today to The Maine Agriculture in the Classroom Association
The Non-profit, completely volunteer, portion of MAITC. These funds are used directly to support teacher scholarships and recognition, and support volunteer participation for Ag education programs. Your donation is completely tax deductible and you can make a one-time donation or a recurring monthly donation which will support the mission, "to promote the understanding of agriculture and natural resources among students, educators, and the general public." If you have any other questions or would like to join this group please contact the chairman, Maryjane Stafford. Donate Here.
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Our Mission Statement
"To promote the understanding of agriculture and natural resources among students, educators, and the general public"
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28 State House Station
Augusta, ME 04333
(207)287-5522
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