Ecole Leila North Community School, Winnipeg, MB
Plant a Seed and See What Grows Foundation Grant, 2024
Our Food and Nutrition Programs go above and beyond to nurture positive food relationships, teach students about sustainable food education, reducing food waste and the importance of knowing where your food comes from and building relationships with the people who make our food system possible.
Our school has a number of hands-on community learning projects and connections to providing holistic environmental education opportunities:
Our school has gardens located on the school grounds and a garden space we share with the local fire station. Students learn about the life cycle of food and pollinator plants, from starting seeds and germination to growth, harvesting and seed saving. The resources provided by these garden spaces are shared throughout the school in multiple classroom settings, including art programs, food literacy programs, and food-sharing initiatives.
Since 2021, our school has connected with Fireweed Food Co-op on various projects to connect with local farmers, including farm tours, food waste upcycling, trying new local foods, and more. The FFC is a cooperative of small-scale farmers and supporters of local food systems. They work with 45 + local farmers and a wide variety of chefs, community partners and other food system stakeholders.
The Dig In! Seed Grant has allowed us the opportunity to further connect with Fireweed Food Co-op and their network and provide multiple hands-on learning experiences for students. We have hosted three workshops for over 50 students, one cooking class with a local chef and two workshops with farmers and farm products.
Students connected with Chef Max, a local chef who taught students how to make hot sauce using local ingredients, including locally grown hot peppers, onions, garlic and honey. Christine, a former chef and farmer from Peg City Fresh, walked students through the process of seed-saving using local squash. And finally, Louise May from Aurora Farm taught students about various farm products and showed them how to make felted soap using goat’s milk soap from her farm, felt, dried herbs and flowers.
We are beyond grateful to the Plant a Seed and Watch What Grows Foundation and F2CC for the funding we received and are excited to continue the learning and connections in 2025 and beyond.
If you want to follow along on our school journey here are our Instagram Pages:
Thank you!
