The Best Harvest I Will Ever Produce

Teach a child to grow and you feed them for a lifetime...

“Who’s feeling muscular today?” I asked the third graders as we congregated beside the school garden.

Several hands shot up, “Oh—Me! Me! I do!”

“Okay—you guys are going to help me with the compost bin. We need to use this tool to pry up the bin so we can harvest all of the finished material.” And to the nearest volunteer I handed a heavy ice pick—a long-handled solid pipe with a wedge on the end.

“The next project,” I addressed the rest of the group. “Is taking down the deer netting and requires using a pair of wire-cutters. Who would like to work on that?”

HI. I’m Sam from Maine Homestead Life, a newsletter that teaches the skills our grandparents knew: how to grow, raise, and make REAL food and live independently from corporate food systems.

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In This Post:

Growing Gardeners at Kingfield Elementary
Some of My Favorite Moments
Annual Harvest Dinner
The Best Harvest I Will Ever Produce

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Photo credit: Pixabay

Growing Gardeners at Kingfield Elementary

Fridays are for Growing Gardeners at Kingfield Elementary.

It’s a program established a decade ago by Kindergarten teacher, Selina Warren, and now continued under the direction of Erica Luce, KES’ second grader teacher. Serving in the kitchen last year and having ties to the Greater Franklin Food Council, I managed to get my foot in the door as School Garden Coach and that role has been a special privilege for this friendly neighborhood farmer.

Hamming it up for the kids, I like to go in my Carhartt overalls and wearing farm-themed earrings—something Dan likes to call: “full-on Farmer Sam mode”.

What was an afternoon program this spring, I’ve expanded to a day-long event this fall. In the mornings I visit with each class for 25 minutes, using those sessions to teach a structured lesson. Then in the afternoon, we’re engaging the kids outside in the garden.

Photo credit: Farm to School BC via Creative Commons License

Some of My Favorite Moments

• Doling out seeds into the many little hands surrounding me.

• Searching the dropped “lanterns” of a ground-cherry bush looking for an orangish blush. Then, letting little fingers peel back the papery husk and coaxing the child to try something new.

• Every time a student would claim the spot next to me, slipping their tiny hand into mine and effectively melting my heart.

• Showing Kindergardeners how to use a shovel: drive the blade into the soil, then use your muscles to lift and turn. I always stress that we need to keep the soil IN the bed, and—most importantly: how to be safe with our tools (ie: no swinging them around, throwing them, and especially NOT flinging the dirt at our friends.)

• That time I pulled out the battery-powered hedge trimmers for the third and forth graders to use in cutting back the end-of-season growth. I taught the first student how to properly handle the tool, then supervised, allowing each student to demonstrate to the next how to use it.

• Learning to follow a recipe: we made salad dressing under the pavilion in rampant winds. I had to block the wind so the kids could measure out spices without get garlic powder in their eyes.

• Dissecting! Kids love “dissecting”—and it doesn’t have to be frogs, lol. In teaching the kids about seeds, we dissected a number of vegetables and flower-heads to look at the different types of seeds and plants’ methods for seed-dispersal.

• Exposing the kids to the concept of microbes. Microbes in the soil. Microbes in our bodies. Teeny-tiny microorganism that play crucial roles in our world.

• Every. Single. Hug. EVER.

Annual Harvest Dinner

This Thursday, the Growing Gardeners program culminates in Kingfield Elementary’s annual Harvest Dinner.

Using the vegetables we grew over the course of the season, the students will prepare a community meal their families have been invited to. The school hosts local farm vendors, teachers set up games and activities, and the kids serve up the food they’ve cooked.

Our theme this year is “Meet Your Neighbors: Canada and Mexico”. The kids have spent the last several weeks learning about industries, culture and the foods unique to those regions. To celebrate all of this learning, we’ve come up with a menu consisting of dishes specific to those countries: shepherds’ pie, chips and salsa, poutine, and carrot cake with maple frosting.

Photo credit: RawPixel via Creative Commons License

The Best Harvest I Will EVER Produce

If you’ve been following along with my story, you know I’ve lamented the impact the lunch-lady job has had on Runamuk.

Stepping away from the farm didn’t help me get ahead in the way I’d hoped, and—because school doesn’t let out for summer vacation until mid-June—I effectively missed the spring planting window. Once I could finally return to farming, pressure from drought and our abundant local deer population decimated what little I managed to grow.

Yet, that lunch-lady job allowed me to slip into the position of school garden coach. And when I survey the crop of young gardeners I’ve cultivated this season, I know without a doubt that this is my harvest—and quite possibly the best harvest I will ever produce.

They say: “give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” A zucchini might make a family dinner, but a child who learns to grow food nourishes generations to come. This is the work that will outlive me—a harvest that never ends and I’m grateful to walk this path.

Thanks for reading! I hope this essay helps you along your homesteading journey. If you have any thoughts or questions, feel free to drop a comment below!

Sending love and good juju to you and yours.

Your friendly neighborhood farmer,

—Sam

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PS—Thank you for following along on this farming journey! Living this life on the land is a profound privilege—caring for my family, serving our community, and protecting the wildlife that shares this space with us. Every word I write, every story I share, supports hands-on conservation work right here on the farm.

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