Agriculture: The Original STEM challenge

I am of the opinion that if you can solve problems that arise in agriculture, you can pretty much solve any problem that life throws at you.  For example, let’s say your tomato plant leaves are withered, brown and discolored.  Well, that is something that you have to problem-solve in order to have tomatoes.  First, you’d probably begin by making a guess as to what might be wrong.  Then, you probably would talk to someone or ask a more experienced gardener.  Perhaps, you might change things. You might even try watering less or adding fertilizer.  This is the process that scientists and engineers use to solve problems and ultimately to design new products.  However, farmers have been doing this for ages.  The processes that scientists and engineers use may be more standardized and structured ,but it goes back to the farmer’s work and thinking about how to fix his/her crops in times of droughts, floods, pests, or soil problems.

I believe that if we ask our students to grow plants from seed to fruit and allow them to solve the problems that arise, we give them the critical thinking skills to overcome many problems that they will encounter in the real world.  Furthermore, challenging students to grow food, teaches them to persevere, collaborate, research, and experiment.

Some of the English learners that are in our classes may have grown up farming themselves, been around parents who have farmed, or may have lived in communities where farming is essential and ever-present.  These students come to our classes having already mastered many of the problems that agriculture has dealt them.  By comparison, a problem such as finding the author’s point of view and explaining how it differs in two of his/her works will be easy for them.

If teachers capitalize on students’ funds of knowledge about agriculture, teachers may see how much “grit” and predisposition to collaboration that English learners and all students bring to school.  Further, schools and teachers honor the non-traditional learning methods that ELs and others bring if we give them an outdoor space and the means to grow their own food from seeds.

Recently, I read about an irrigation system called, “olla”.  Olla, a Spanish word for “pot or urn”, is an irrigation system that dates back to pre-Colombian times.  It works by burying clay pots in the soil between or beside sprouts.  Water is slowly released over time providing water to the plants.  I think this is a very creative invention.  An inexpensive, practical way to deliver water slowly to plants and eliminating daily watering.  I can only imagine the agricultural “STEM challenge” that fueled the farmer to create this invention.  Further, that it was done by people that look like the English learners that we teach can give them inspiration that they too can do this.

Published by

Anthony Nesbit

I am an ESL teacher with Craven County Schools working to incorporate STEM activities into the classroom to improve the school to STEM career pipeline.