Out of all the accomplishments this week, I was most excited to finally attend my first School Gardens Field Trip! I went to the bank ahead of time, and helped locate ingredients required for Mango Lassi, and pulled them to the side for one of the school events happening the next evening. Through this, I was able to refresh my memory on expiration dates of different dairy products. I do not ever drink dairy milk, so this was very interesting to learn about how long the different milk products should last, usually depending on their fat content. Whole milk (whole fat) should last about 5 days past the expiration date, where non-fat milk can last up to 10 days past the expiration date.

Being a part of a school garden’s field trip was incredibly fun. I was impressed by all the students’ interest and knowledge of the plants in the garden. I helped put together snacks for the students coming in. They were able to try strawberries, blueberries, apples, peas, pea shoots and some even tried rhubarb harvested from their garden that day. Michaela made a very good point by stating she noticed the students were more willing to try the variety of foods in their snack boats when they saw the plants in the garden and were given the snacks outside, rather than being taught about the foods in the classroom and ate the snacks inside. This is definitely powerful knowledge and I think it’s incredibly important to recognize this, and put kids outside in an environment or classroom as often as possible.