LOUISA COUNTY, Va. β Some students don't know that chicken nuggets are actually made of chicken. It sounds silly, but knowledge of farming is something some students just don't get.
Not in Louisa County.
Fifth-graders across four elementary schools in Louisa County are getting hands-on agricultural education through a collaborative field trip program that's bringing farm life directly to students.
The 450 students are learning from a joint effort by Louisa County Public Schools, Louisa FFA, Louisa 4-H, and the Virginia Cooperative Extension Office in Louisa. This is just the second year the schools have held this agricultural fair event.
For fifth-graders like Olivia and Paisley, the experience is both fun and educational as they rotate through different stations of rural learning.
"I just hope everybody leaves here learning that agriculture is one of the most important industries in the world," Kylie Hoffman said.
Hoffman, a 4H Program Educator, finds personal fulfillment in sharing agricultural knowledge with young students.
"I just think of myself as a kid and how they engraved me as a kid, and I just, it makes me so happy to be able to put that in perspective for these kids and see that, see myself and these kids learning and growing and with their passion," Hoffman said.
The program serves multiple educational purposes beyond just introducing students to farm animals.
Heather Spaid, Director of Elementary Education, sees the experience as crucial preparation for upcoming academic lessons.
"I'm hoping that they will have background knowledge in math and science so that when they start teaching area and perimeter next week, they will have, um, a foothold on what it is used for instead of something that's abstract and not really useful," Spaid said.
The agricultural fair also helps students prepare for their science SOLs by providing real-world context for mathematical and scientific concepts.
"We have talked a lot about how farmers have to be very well versed in mathematics when they're selling an animal, when they're measuring for fencing, or when they are feeding, um, their livestock, all kinds of things, all kinds of math goes into agriculture and so does science," Spaid said.
For many students, this represents their first exposure to farm life and agricultural practices.
"Some of these students have never seen them in real life, have never smelled what an agriculture or a farm, what a farm smells like, and they have never seen animals in person. So that, that is another way that we can bring science to life and introduce them to a world that they may not have known existed for them," Spaid said.
When asked what animals they would have if they lived on a farm, students eagerly shared their dreams: "I'd say a horse, bunnies, and cows."
Building a love of farm life is building better minds.
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