Farming for children

I’ve blogged recently about various outdoor play activities and the benefits of gardening and growing produce in early years settings. One of our visitors alerted me to a charity called Farming and Countryside Education (FACE), which may be of interest in this context.

FACE aims to educate children and young people about food and farming in a sustainable countryside. In particular they aim to stimulate interest and excitement, link to all aspects and stages of the school curriculum; allow pupils to see rural activities such as food production first-hand; introduce pupils to a host of leisure activities in the countryside and introduce pupils to rural career opportunities and the world of work.

They have over 80 partner membership organisations all of which have a commitment to educational work associated with food, farming and the countryside.

Free resources and workshops

The FACE website is filled with lots of useful information as well as many free curriculum resources which you can download. These include various farming fact sheets and a few interactive games relating to farm animals and the food chain.

You may also be interested to know that FACE has teamed up with Harper Adams University College to offer a series of FREE food and farming awareness workshops for teachers and teaching assistants. They have workshops running throughout May and June (and I believe more dates are being added for later in the year) in locations throughout the UK: //www.face-online.org.uk/face-seminars/reap-training

Live farm webcam

The National Trust’s My Farm website has a really good webcam showing live pictures from various parts of a working farm: //www.my-farm.org.uk/on-the-farm/live-webcam

The website also has video footage of previous goings on at the farm such as the birth of lambs and piglets.

The website is part of the National Trust’s My Farm project an online experiment in farming and food production, giving up to 10,000 members of the public a say in the running of a farm on Wimpole Estate, near Royston in Cambridgeshire. Members will be able to vote on every aspect of the farm: the crops that they grow, the breeds of animal they stock, the facilities and machinery they use and invest in. The aim of the project is to encourage widespread debate around food and farming, as well as making people aware of the National Trust’s role.

Farm visits

If you’re thinking about planning a school / nursery visit to a farm you may find the Farms for Schools website  useful. It has a directory of farms that are open to schools. Just click on the ‘farms to visit’ tab on the left hand side of the navigation bar towards the top of the page and you can view these farms by geographical location.