I led Lesson 2 on a quiet, rainy Thursday at Front Street Study Center. I initially had the audience of one 5-year old, one 7-year old, and one 8-year old. Later on a 10-year old, 12-year old, and 13-year old joined and eventually a few more students filtered in. Everyone was very intrigued when I pulled out the vegetables and paint and proceeded to tell the students that we would be using them for an art project. I gave each student the option to pick their own colors of paint and we began with a demonstration of how to use the veggies to print. The young boy in the first picture asked a great question: how does our food get to Maine? Along with one of the coordinators at Front Street, we had a long discussion with him about how our food gets to Maine, and what foods are grown in Maine. I asked him if he had ever heard of climate change, and he said no. But another student who was a few years older said yes, she helped me explain to him what climate change was and how humans are causing it. We talked about how gases are released from cars, factories, and the farts of cows (he loved that one) and how those gases trap heat within earth's atmosphere, raising the temperature of the earth and melting our icecaps and raising our sea levels. He was very engaged and I could tell that some sort of breakthrough was made with him, he had a pretty firm grasp on how animal agriculture and the transportation of our food impact climate change. He himself put it together that when our food is flown on airplanes or driven by trucks it is contributing to climate change. I would say this was a very successful lesson that churned out some beautiful art and inspiring conversations. This was a messy project that required a lot of preparation and clean-up but to see the pieces that they created and to hear the conclusions they were coming to made it all worth it.
