Educational farms

Abstract

The present study focuses on educating young children through the intermediary of Educational Farms, a relatively new concept in Malta. It aims at demonstrating the potential of such places to apprise youngsters on elementary topics of vital interest relating to food, its origin and agribusiness in general. The majority of the 90 children participating in the survey exhibited a great level of unfamiliarity with food sources and related themes, even in a small country as Malta, where towns are small and rural areas are in close proximity. This study aims at determining the fact that there should exist closer collaboration between classroom pedagogy and on-the-spot, hands-on activity. This is an optimal way of materialising relatively abstract concepts and translating them into concrete practice. The study will further expound the various reasons for the aforementioned educational vacuum, mainly: demographic changes, relating to population shift from rural areas to cities, where children are no longer in close contact with Nature, and merely glimpse it abstractly from textbooks. Moreover, new lifestyles brought about a drastic change in food patterns, the main culprit being fast food and working parents not finding time to cook nutritious meals which, generally, take time to prepare. The sedentary way of life, including long hours at a computer, watching television and playing video games, resulted in children's being overweight and obese and discarding physical activities.