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Sargent Boy Teaches Children From Omaha About Agriculture
The Ag Pen Pals program links classrooms and farm families from across Nebraska.
Farmers and ranchers exchange letters with school children. The farm families
explain what they do, why and how at the various seasons of the year. They
write the first letter and the school children write back with their questions.
The farm families answer the questions and the letters go back and forth.
Farm families and classes commit to writing at least three times during
the school year, but many write much more frequently. And often, the farm
or ranch family will visit the school, usually in the spring.
Weston Svoboda, a first-grader at Sargent Public School and the son of Scott and Jennifer Svoboda, has been participating in the Ag Pen Pals program this year. He has been communicating with a first grade class at Gomez Heritage Elementary School near downtown Omaha, NE. Their class is made up of children from several different ethnic backgrounds, many who speak an additional language besides English. Over the last several months, Weston has exchanged letters, sent pictures and made videos in hopes of educating his pen pals about agriculture in Nebraska. Recently he ventured to Omaha where he and his mother spent an afternoon with his new friends. He took several samples of different feeds and grains that we raise for human and animal consumption to share with the class. He also showed them several items that we use on the ranch (ear tags, branding iron, lariat, chaps, spurs, halters, etc.) and taught them about the sport of rodeo. The kids all had a chance to try out roping and running a barrel pattern (on a stick horse of course)!
This has been a very exciting and rewarding project for Weston to be a part of. As members of the Nebraska Ag community, it is important that we educate the consumers from the urban population about food production. For more information about participating in the Ag Pen Pals program, feel free to contact the Svoboda family (sdcc@nctc.net) or call the following Ag Pen Pals toll-free number, (800) 546-3496.