SNAP-Ed and Master Gardeners team up for food pantry gardens
SNAP-Ed Staff Make Special Efforts to Teach Nutrition to Hearing Impaired Students It is hard to see a difference when Kathy Ellis, SNAP-Education instructor, presents “It’s Fun to be Healthy” curriculum at Valeska Hinton Early Childhood Education Center in Peoria. The pre-school students are happy and active three, four, and five-year-olds. The difference with this specific classroom is the entire class is hearing impaired. “One of Extension’s objectives is to reach underserved audiences,” explained County Director Earl Allen. “That includes people with disabilities. Kathy’s efforts at Valeska are one example of the work our staff does to reach a variety of underserved audiences.” The core of Kathy’s monthly lesson at Valeska stays the same for this classroom. The difference is that Kathy works alongside a sign language interpreter and she also wears a special Bluetooth-enabled microphone. These special efforts allow Kathy and the students to interact and engage with each other like a typical classroom. “I notice the classroom teachers making their own special efforts by introducing new vocabulary words and the corresponding signs,” Kathy mentioned. “Words like stir and cinnamon are new words they were practicing the signs for during our most recent lesson about dairy foods.” The students are always included in the process of making the snack. Each student takes a turn adding, stirring, or measuring.
Volunteers at Common Place Food Pantry encourage shoppers to take fresh produce grown in the garden and new recipes.
Master Gardeners and SNAPEducation staff collaborated on a project to help address the issue of food access to those in need. There are many “giving gardens” throughout the four counties. The Jr. Master Gardeners garden in Havana and the Peoria Common Place garden and hoop house were identified for this special project designed to create a partnership with local food pantries. While the Master Gardeners focused on growing the food, SNAP-Ed staff worked with Mission of Hope and Common Place food pantries to help make improvements to do things such as display healthful messaging, provide seasonal recipes, and offer additional resources. One of the greatest challenges identified was helping clients learn how to cook produce from the garden. “We noticed more clients taking fresh vegetables and herbs when we bundled them and included a recipe using those items,” noted Kaitlyn Streitmatter, SNAP-Ed educator. Both food pantries improved their food environment assessment scores at least 15 points by implementing the SNAP-Ed recommendations. The most important improvement was getting more people to eat fresh produce.
