AgLIT

AgLIT is a standards-based, fully STEM-integrated upper-elementary agricultural literacy curriculum module that encourages the development of 21st century, STEM, and agricultural knowledge, skills, and attitudes/beliefs. The primary goal of this curriculum module is to increase students' agricultural and STEM literacy - or knowledge, skills, and attitudes/beliefs about agricultural and STEM subjects.

This unit will provide upper-elementary students with concepts in agricultural education that include the food and fiber systems and their interrelationships with the environment, social and political systems, and the global economy. Focusing on upper-elementary students is particularly important to increase their awareness of where their food and fibers originate and how their choices impact their health and nutrition, as well as the environment around them, in an effort to create healthy habits and globally conscientious consumers.

While the National Research Council [NRC] (1988) suggests that all students from K-12 leave school with some degree of agricultural literacy, most students do not. Many curricula that offer agricultural content focus primarily on gardening and plant life or food and nutrition, leaving students with misconceptions and a lack of understanding of the breadth and importance of agriculture and its myriad interconnections within society.

This unit will answer such questions as where our food and fiber come from; what is required to grow, harvest, process, and distribute food and fiber; and how agriculture is connected throughout the community, economy, environment, and world. Students shall come away with an integrated understanding of STEM and agricultural literacy.

Throughout the unit students will participate in authentic, project-based STEM activities and lessons designed to assimilate the understanding of the food and fiber system (including its history and current economic, social, and environmental significance to all Americans) with the knowledge of food and fiber production, processing, and domestic and international marketing. Students will be able to synthesize, analyze, and communicate information about agriculture, STEM, and all the interconnections between the subjects.

They will experience agriculture by reading background content knowledge in an interactive iBook, through videotaped lessons from a working farm, participate in hands-on tasks involving by-product production, and act as farmers while applying their knowledge to realistic situations. The unit will include a trip to the farm they had studied and participation in a game-based, value-added augmented reality challenge testing their understanding of food, fiber, and the environment as students prepare for a virtual farmers market.

Want to learn more? Read about AgLIT's Framework!