Pick Your Own Berries at a Georgia Farm

Our cafeteria Farm to School programs are meant to educate the kids about the value of eating locally grown, fresh fruits and vegetables:

1. Their nutrient content is higher because they ripen on the plant

2. They reduce your carbon footprint by not having been shipped cross-country

3. They build the local economy (and local public school system) by keeping money in-state, and keep local farmers in business.

What better way to learn this than to put the kids to work picking their own locally grown food? Georgia berries are coming in to season, starting with strawberries this month, and next blueberries in June.

If you’re not growing them at home, a great online resource is PickYourOwn.org, where you can see exactly what a farm is growing by county, as well as find picking/canning/storing tips. Farms listed in GREEN use natural or organic growing methods (so kids don’t have to pick in pesticide-sprayed fields). Always call ahead, because weather conditions affect crops and farm open hours. Most provide collection buckets, but check to make sure you don’t need to bring your own containers.

Two farms you’ll find at PickYourOwn.org that use natural growing practices are:

Lone Oak Farm, 7633 Forrest Road, Grantville, GA (about 1 hour South of Dunwoody) – strawberries, Vidalia onions (7 for $5), blueberries

DJ’s U-Pick Blueberry Farm, 1839 Prospect Road, Lawrenceville, GA 30043 (about 30 minutes Northeast of Dunwoody) – blueberries ($10 a gallon), cows/goats for the kids to feed, vegetables from their garden

If you have a favorite local PYO farm, please share it below in the comments – and happy picking!

There’s Fungus Among Us

At March’s Ecology Club meeting, Chesnut Changers welcomed two very cool guest speakers and their spawn:  Howard Berk and Todd Pittard of 2funguys.com.

They taught us that mushrooms need only shade, moisture and wood to grow (they live off the sugars in the wood), and let the kids handle dried shiitake mushrooms. Each Chesnut Changer had the chance to inoculate logs that Berk and Pittard had pre-drilled for shiitake spawn inserts. These were placed in a shady spot in Chesnut Garden, where we’ll keep them moist for about 9 months before they will produce a first harvest (they are expected to produce for three years).

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Berk and Pittard also talked to us about eating only those mushrooms that our parents put on the plate, because mushrooms you find growing in the wild are very often poisonous. The kids enjoyed seeing 2funguys’ slideshow of mushroom varieties, and were bummed to discover that the very cool glow-in-the-dark Jack-o-Lantern mushrooms are poisonous (“Awwwwww!”).

Chesnut Changers thank Mr. Berk and Mr. Pittard for sharing their mushroom enthusiasm with Chesnut students, and answering all our questions (“what are these gills under the mushroom?). We also learned that mushrooms naturally contain a carcinogen, which is eliminated by heating, which is why Mr. Pittard recommends cooking mushrooms for at least 5 minutes rather than eating raw.

At-Home Actions: Grow Your Own Mushrooms and Roast Them!

2funguys.com is a great locally-owned place to get your mushroom logs. Some of our parents purchased logs to take home after the meeting, but you can also order from their online store.

Here’s a recipe from Chop Chop Magazine (cooking for kids)

Roasted Mushrooms

- 1 pound assorted mushrooms (you can use any combination of button, white, shiitake, portobello, cremini or oyster mushrooms), left whole if small, or quartered or halved if large

- 1 garlic clove, minced

- 1 tsp. salt

- 1/2 tsp. black pepper

1. Turn the oven on to BAKE and set it to 400 degrees.

2. Put the mushrooms on the baking sheet and add the olive oil, garlic, salt, and pepper. Mix well with clean hands or spoon.

3. Put the baking sheet in the oven. Roast until the mushrooms are golden brown, 20 to 30 minutes.

4. Serve right away or cover and refrigerate up to overnight.

Locally Grown Strawberries Produce Chesnut’s First Schoolwide 100% Tasting Rate

Visit any classroom in Chesnut and you will be looking at some super SUPER fresh eaters.

March’s Farm to School lunch item — Georgia-grown strawberries — was well loved by all the kids. So much so, that for the first time since the Chesnut Changers began promoting the locally grown monthly food, they reported that in all classes, every student who had strawberries, tried them! That is a success for the Ecology Club’s Farm to School promotion, but better yet, a sign that our kids are really enjoying fresh fruit.

In fact, some of the students needed reassuring that these strawberries would not be steeped in a simple sugar syrup, as the fruit has been served in the past. One 4th grader who had declared in the lunch line that he would not be eating those, later at his lunch table happily held up his chosen fresh strawberry to show he was glad to take a taste — if it was the real deal.

Several of these discerning young eaters even commented that the strawberries with white at the top had a tartness to them, while the all-red ones were sweeter. We discussed why that might be, tying it into what we had learned about colors during our November Farm to School Nutrition lesson, “Tasting a Rainbow of Plants.” Considering that the fruit’s color develops as it ripens, they correctly guessed that the white-topped strawberries were not as mature as the all-red ones.

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Chesnut Wins Gardening Grant Just in Time to Fund 3rd Graders’ Presidential Campaign

Anne Marie Walkup, Erika Peltier and Nakailey Jackson for Chesnut President!

These third grade Chesnut Changers want “a bigger garden so the lunch ladies will have fresher food to cook for the kids.” And they are not afraid to get their hands dirty planting it!

Kitchen Gardeners International to the rescue! Today they listed Chesnut Garden as one of their Sow It Forward full grant winners. They must agree with these young ladies that this program is worthy of presidential attention, because they selected Chesnut as one of 50 winners out of 925 applicants from 48 states and 11 countries.

The grant includes $300 cash, $200 garden supply gift card, $55 worth of seeds, a book and one-year subscription to KGI Garden Planner. Thank you KGI!

We plan to use the money to fulfill the wish of fifth grade teacher Timika Howard, who thought of using geometrically shaped raised beds as math teaching tools for area and division. Whether or not they are elected to School President, Ms. Peltier, Ms. Walkup, and Ms. Jackson WILL soon have a bigger Chesnut Garden, where as fifth graders, they will decide what to grow in their new beds. Though they won’t make it into the lunchroom because of county regulations, their crops could certainly become another math lesson, as the students measure quantities in a recipe, for a delicious snack they grew themselves!

Snow Peas in Winter, English Peas in Spring

Last month, Ms. Radford’s 1st graders came out to the Chesnut Garden to taste the snow peas.  They paired up, one child cutting the pea off the vine and the other cutting it into two pieces so they could each have a taste.

Soon after, it was time to plant more peas (of a different nature). All four Kindergarten classes and the 4th and 5th grade collaborative class came out to the garden (in the sprinkling rain!) to each push one English pea seed into the dirt.

Garden Leader Carissa Malone showed them how the snow peas were growing as a trellised vine, and explained how English peas grow differently, forming small bushes. She also pointed out that while we shell English peas (opening the pods to eat the seeds inside), we eat the entire snow pea pod.

Mr. Chicoine’s Kindergarteners were given the important job of delivering a large bag each of the Swiss chard harvest and parsley harvest, to Principal Veronica Williams and Assistant Principal Lloyd McFarlane, both strong supporters of Chesnut’s gardening program.

Snow Peas Ready for Harvesting

Snow Peas Climb Trellis

A Rainy Day for Planting English Peas

Planting English Peas

Parsley Harvest

Let’s Put Some of This Rain To Good Use!

Chesnut Changers Upcycle and Recycle

At our last two ecology club meetings, Chesnut Changers talked about reducing waste and putting our pledge, “Reuse, Reduce, Recycle” into practice.

We welcomed special guests, Chesnut’s Recycling Team (sponsored by fifth grade teacher Timika Howard), who facilitated our first upcycling project. Their commitment to protecting the environment is serious and they set a tone of organized efficiency as we worked on our project.

First Recycling Drive:  Save Those Broken Crayons!

Deposit Crayon Bits Here!

The Recycling Team and Chesnut Changers Ecology Club are partnering to introduce a series of recycling drives at Chesnut, to raise awareness about recyclable items that are normally trashed. Each of the three ecology club age groups decorated receptacles for upcoming crayon, battery and sneaker drives, with messages about recycling and reducing waste.

During the month of January, Chesnut students can deposit crayons in the large crayon receptacle inside the cafeteria, either in the morning before school or after dismissal.

Project 1: Cards to Ornaments

Before the holidays, we used greeting cards, cereal and cracker boxes to create hanging globes for ornaments, decoration or gifts. The kids did an amazing job, some even adding hanging elements inside the globes.  

At-Home Action: Paper Globes. See picture #3 and the “Globes How-To” section here to make your own.

You’ll need: scissors, hole punch, string/yarn, brads, any card stock or think cardboard (greeting cards, cereal boxes, etc.).

Project 2: Juice Boxes to Wallets

In yesterday’s ecology club meeting, we learned that “upcycling” is taking something considered garbage, and giving it new life as a different object. Students also examined why juice boxes and other composite cartons (like Tetra Pak) are rarely recyclable:  they are made of paper, plastic and aluminum layers that require a special machine to recycle. Because our county doesn’t accept composite cartons, we worked on a way to make them useful rather than throwing them in the trash.

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At-Home Action: Tetra Pak Wallets (juice boxes make mini-wallets). See this video tutorial to make your own. Note that the duct tape is optional, but recommended for durability.

You’ll need: scissors, duct tape, stick-on hook/loop, stickers (optional).