Stories from the field

Growing up, math was like a foreign language. I literally could not understand what the teachers were saying, especially as they were often writing on the chalkboard with their backs to the class. My mom tried everything—even resorting to a book called “Overcoming Math Anxiety”—but math simply did not and would not make sense to…

“My philosophy is, we find out what challenges a community faces and ask how can we help them,” Devlin says. It’s a philosophy shared by many libraries across the country that are increasingly developing mobile food programs to teach food literacy and deliver wholesome meals and snacks to children and adults who might otherwise lack…

Across the country, organizations have found exciting ways to reach communities and teach students about nutrition and healthy eating through cooking. “Charlie Cart has enabled us to offer fun cooking programs for kids that are run by staff,” says Oakland (CA) Public Library (OPL) acting director Lana Adlawan. Recent cooking programs at OPL have featured…

Liz’s Healthy Table Podcast Episode 40: Home Ec is Hip with Carolyn Federman + Cookbook Giveaway

Carolyn Federman recalls one of the first dishes she cooked as a child. It was meatloaf and mashed potatoes, and it was for her mom. “I remembered my dad was out of town, my siblings were gone. It was just the two of us,” she said.

With home economics fading into memory, an educator in California is working to get kids cooking. The Charlie Cart Project is a hands-on cooking program that teaches food literacy and cooking in schools. It is a fully equipped, colorful mobile kitchen and well-researched recipe binder that follows the seasons and curriculum for kindergarten through fifth grade. Carolyn…

A lot of energy goes into school gardens these days. But what about the other half of the healthy eating equation? Kids who hate spinach or kale are proven to eat more of it after they’ve used it in a cooking class, and hands-on classes can also help fight childhood obesity and diabetes. But it’s fairly rare…