January- Ag Careers!

I had a great time meeting with the 4th graders today!  Our topic was Careers in Agriculture.  I had planned that we would play "Ag Career Bingo" I may have misjudged my timing a little and found myself in a little bit of a crunch prior to getting to the school.  Thanks to some of my amazing co-workers, pulling together to help cut out  500 1"x1" bingo pieces!  They were a huge help!

When I arrived in the classroom I had the students design their own bingo cards with several agricultural careers in the spots where numbers usually reside.  We went through a short powerpoint highlighting several careers in agriculture including: Loan Officer, Truck Driver, Chemist, Agronomist, Machinery Salesman, Farmer, Rancher, Animal Nutritionist and many others.  We then played a game of Ag Career Bingo, where I drew out definitions of the careers and the kids got to guess which career I was talking about!  We heard some great stories about how almost each of the students knew someone with a career in agriculture!

Next week they will be attending the KMOT Ag Expo in Minot for Living Ag Classroom , please stay tuned for another blog post!

Here are some pictures from today:

My awesome co-workers helping me out!  Thanks Darrell, Bryan, Doug & Ruth!!!

Checking out some Ag Careers!

Everyone got to make their own Bingo Cards!

All of the students are such good listeners!

Sweet Bingo markers for sweet kids!

December...It's never to cold for Ice Cream

The December meeting was fantastic!


I had mentioned a few times to the 4th graders that we may make ice cream for one of our classroom meetings.


North Dakota Farm Bureau graciously donated books to the students titled "Mini Milkmaids on the Moove"  It is one of many Accurate Ag Books promoted by American Farm Bureau.  Accurate Ag books are written for many reading levels to teach youth about the truths of Agriculture.  In this particular book, written by a pair of young twin girls from Maryland and their mother, two girls get to experience many different aspects of the dairy industry.  They tour a dairy farm where they help milk and feed, and also tour a creamery where they bottle milk and make ice cream!  At the end of the book their are recipes for Ice Cream in a bag as well as Butter in a jar.


Dakota Agronomy Partners donated supplies for the students to make their own ice cream so after reading the book, the excited 4th graders got to work combining the ingredients and shaking their resealable bags for about 8 minutes.  We even had chocolate toppings and the kids said it was delicious!

Shaking up the ice cream!

brr looks like it's getting a little cold!

The Birthday girl Trying out her ice cream!

If you are interested in learning more about accurate Ag Books please check out the following webiste:

http://www.agfoundation.org/

November...Fertilize, Fertilize, Fertilize

In November I thought we could take an opportunity to learn about crop nutrients.

The fall is an important time for farmers.  Harvest is almost done and many farmers are thinking about replenishing their fields with nutrients.

The class and I started out our conversation with talking about the nutrients needed to grow crops in large amounts.  We talked about 4 Macro nutrients (nutrients needed in large amounts by plants)
Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Potassium, and Sulfur.  I brought in samples of products we put on fields to increase field concentration of these nutrients such as Urea and Manure as a Nitrogen source, Mono-ammonium phosphate and  MicroessentialsSZ as Phosphorus products, Potash as a Potassium Source, and Ammonium Sulfate as a source of Sulfur.  We also talked about what plants look like when they are lacking each of these nutrients.

After our quick lesson we played a game called Tic-Tac Agriculture where the kids got to test their knowledge on what they just learned.  I found some great templates for power point games on the website http://jc-schools.net/tutorials/ppt-games/.  There were many different options to create games of your choice to make learning and teaching about a variety of topics very fun!

October Meeting

I walked through the door of my first meeting with the 4th graders pretty nervous.  I love to see the faces of 9-10 year olds.  Their desire to gather information is displayed in their smiley and eager faces.  There were several questions and many comments about what Agriculture is and who all is involved in this vast industry.

We spent our hour talking different crops grown in North Dakota such as Wheat, Barley, Canola, Corn, Flax, Soybeans and several others.  We also talked about things needed to help crops grow such as Fertilizer, Herbicide, and Fungicide. We talked about animal agriculture and many other sectors of the very large industry.  There were many stories that I was able to hear about the student's involvement in agriculture as well as questions pertaining to many subjects. The lively bunch was so excited and I was so excited to be there!

I left quite a bit more confident then when I showed up, the year is destined to be an exciting one!

So I started a little late, but here is my first post!

I am starting off my first official Blog post on my Classroom Agriculture Blog a little later that I wanted.  That being said. I'm glad I have figured out how to navigate a blog so I can start this!  In the fall of 2010, I approached a teacher of a local 4th grade classroom.  He allowed me the opportunity to come in to his classroom once a month and teach his students about Agriculture!  I have a passion for the industry so many of us hold dear to our hearts and would love to encourage area youth to take it upon themselves to learn about this fantastic way of life!

As an Agronomist, this doesn't really fall into my job description.  However, thankfully I work for a company that encourages this practice and when I mentioned taking this opportunity my boss and co-workers were nothing but encouraging!

In the following blog posts I will highlight each session that I have had so far and will continue to update on events that give me the opportunity to teach about agriculture as well as some amazing opportunities I receive to learn about our industry!