Name: Amanda Berg
Title: Stranded! - Food Deserts
Time Needed: 45 minutes
Subject Area/Topic: Social Studies- Food Justice
Grade Level: 3rd grade
Essential Questions of Unit:
1. What is the relationship between privilege, poverty, and consumption?
2. What are the implications of access to nutritious food for a community?
3. How do we as students become involved in the food justice movement?
Essential Questions of Lesson:
1.How does location influence access to nutritious food?
2.What is a food desert?
3. What factors might influence the decisions of where a grocery store is placed and how do those choices impact a community?
Materials:
-chart paper
-markers
-signs marked with “Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree, Strongly Disagree”
-tape
-computer with internet
-projector
-loose paper
-note cards
-pencils
MMSD Curriculum Standards Connections:
Grade 3 Content Focus: Madison and Communities Around the World
Political Science and Citizenship:
3.Give examples of how the government does or does not provide for the needs and wants of people, establish order and security, and manage conflicts
Economics:
5.Give examples of how economic resources in the home, school, and community are limited (scarcity) and how people must make choices about how to use these resources.
Behavioral Science:
6.Demonstrate an ability to interact within a group while performing various group roles.
8.Apply and practice skills of conflict resolution.
NCSS Standards Connections:
NCSS Standard 7: Production, Distribution, Consumption
Elementary Education Standards Connections:
Standard 10: Employs varied instructional strategies
Standard 11: Uses Technologies
Standard 12: Accommodates for all students
Lesson Objectives:
Lesson Context:
Lesson Opening:
-->”Everyone can get healthy food"
-->”Grocery stores should get to build their stores wherever they want"
After, we will come back together as a large group on the carpet and I will ask students what the experience was like for them. After reflecting, I will then transition my students by stating that “today, we are going to be learning about another factor that influences people’s food choices, and that is location.”
Procedural Steps
*“Where do you think food deserts are the most prevalent, or common?”
*“How do you think living in a food desert influences a family’s food choices?”
Lesson Closure:
Assessment Strategies:
Lesson Adapted from:
http://www.tolerance.org/activity/food-deserts-causes-consequences-and-solutions
Food Deserts: Causes, Consequences, and Solutions
By Teaching Tolerance
Resource used for the activity:
Food Desert Locator. (2012, August 23). Retrieved December 12, 2012, from USDA Economic Research Service website: http://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food-desert-locator/go-to-the-locator.aspx
Title: Stranded! - Food Deserts
Time Needed: 45 minutes
Subject Area/Topic: Social Studies- Food Justice
Grade Level: 3rd grade
Essential Questions of Unit:
1. What is the relationship between privilege, poverty, and consumption?
2. What are the implications of access to nutritious food for a community?
3. How do we as students become involved in the food justice movement?
Essential Questions of Lesson:
1.How does location influence access to nutritious food?
2.What is a food desert?
3. What factors might influence the decisions of where a grocery store is placed and how do those choices impact a community?
Materials:
-chart paper
-markers
-signs marked with “Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree, Strongly Disagree”
-tape
-computer with internet
-projector
-loose paper
-note cards
-pencils
MMSD Curriculum Standards Connections:
Grade 3 Content Focus: Madison and Communities Around the World
Political Science and Citizenship:
3.Give examples of how the government does or does not provide for the needs and wants of people, establish order and security, and manage conflicts
Economics:
5.Give examples of how economic resources in the home, school, and community are limited (scarcity) and how people must make choices about how to use these resources.
Behavioral Science:
6.Demonstrate an ability to interact within a group while performing various group roles.
8.Apply and practice skills of conflict resolution.
NCSS Standards Connections:
NCSS Standard 7: Production, Distribution, Consumption
Elementary Education Standards Connections:
Standard 10: Employs varied instructional strategies
Standard 11: Uses Technologies
Standard 12: Accommodates for all students
Lesson Objectives:
- Students will be able to define a food desert.
- Students will be able to consider the implications of a food desert for the individuals who live in that community
- Students will be able to identify the causes of a food desert.
- Students will recognize what influences grocery store locations.
Lesson Context:
- This lesson occurs in the unit after we have already looked at where food comes from and how income can play a role in limiting access to nutritious food. We are continuing to explore the inequities of our current food system by looking at food deserts and how location plays a role in access as well. After this lesson, we will be looking at what efforts are being engaged in to address food inequities and what we can do to join the food justice movement.
Lesson Opening:
- To begin the lesson, we will participate in an activity entitled “Take a Stand” in which there are four signs posted around the room- “Strongly Agree” “Agree” “Disagree” and “Strongly Disagree”. I will tell students that I will read a statement, and I want them to decide how they feel based on the statement I said. I will instruct students that after I read the statement and they decide where they feel they belong, they can talk to the people standing near them, sharing why they chose to stand there. I will also remind students that if upon talking to those in their group they change their mind, they are free to move to wherever they feel most comfortable. We will engage in this activity for the following three statements:
-->”Everyone can get healthy food"
-->”Grocery stores should get to build their stores wherever they want"
After, we will come back together as a large group on the carpet and I will ask students what the experience was like for them. After reflecting, I will then transition my students by stating that “today, we are going to be learning about another factor that influences people’s food choices, and that is location.”
Procedural Steps
- I will first write out “Food Desert” on the board and ask my students what they feel the meaning of a food desert could be. After taking ideas, I will tell my students that a food desert is an area, like a neighborhood or a community, where healthy, affordable food is difficult to obtain.
- I will inform students that we are now going to stand up and discuss the causes and results of a food desert. I will be asking students to get into partners based on the statement, “Find a partner who… is wearing the same color, likes soccer, etc”. The questions my students will be discussing in pairs includes:
*“Where do you think food deserts are the most prevalent, or common?”
*“How do you think living in a food desert influences a family’s food choices?”
- We will then reconvene as a large group, and share out some highlights from our discussion with our partners. I will ask some students to share the ideas their partner came up with.
- Next, we will look at the United States Department of Agriculture Food Desert Locator map, where food deserts across the country are highlighted in red. I will ask students to turn to a partner and share an observation or a pattern that they noticed in the map. I will ask for volunteers to share their observations and prompt my students to try to predict why the features that they notice might exist. I will take any questions or observations.
- I will then divide students into groups of four. Initially, two students in the group will be asked to consider the position of the grocery store, thinking of ideal locations to build a grocery store, what makes a location an appealing place for a grocery store, etc. The other two will consider the position of the people, or consumers, thinking about what they want in a grocery store, why they want a grocery store in their neighborhood, and why having access to a store is important. Students will share their opinions with their group members. After both sides have had the opportunity to share, groups will switch roles and consider another perspective. Again, students will share out amongst the group.
Lesson Closure:
- I will bring all my students back together and ask them to think back to their initial reactions to the statements I read at the beginning of the lesson. I will read the statements again and ask students to reflect on a note card if they still feel the way they did at the beginning of the lesson, if they feel differently, and why. I will also inform my students that over the next few days, we will be considering what is being done to make food more equitable.
Assessment Strategies:
- This lesson involves a great deal of group work, so primarily I will be assessing students based on informally listening in on their conversations with one another. I will be paying particular attention to the implications students identify of living in a food desert and possible connections they see between the inequities of access with both income and location. I will also be assessing students’ exit ticket at the very end of the activity when they complete a written reflection on if their mindset on the statements I originally asked them to decide upon changed or not based on the lesson. The exit ticket will be an ideal way for me to assess where my students’ thinking is now that we are about halfway through our unit and allow me to see if they are understanding the concepts I have exposed them to, the structural inequities that exist in our current food system, and the factors that limit people’s access to healthy food.
Lesson Adapted from:
http://www.tolerance.org/activity/food-deserts-causes-consequences-and-solutions
Food Deserts: Causes, Consequences, and Solutions
By Teaching Tolerance
Resource used for the activity:
Food Desert Locator. (2012, August 23). Retrieved December 12, 2012, from USDA Economic Research Service website: http://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food-desert-locator/go-to-the-locator.aspx