Over 500 fourth graders from nine Lancaster County schools participated in this year’s Lancaster County Agricultural Literacy Festival, which was held virtually in April and May. Now in its 20th year, this event is normally held in person at the Lancaster Event Center Fairgrounds.
Nebraska Extension in Lancaster County organizes the festival. This year’s virtual event was made possible through partnerships with the Nebraska Farm Bureau Foundation’s Nebraska Agriculture in the Classroom program, Southeast Community College’s John Deere Tech program, 4-H volunteers and Classic Dairy Inc.
Video lessons were created on the following topics: Ag Careers, Ag Technology, Beef Cattle, Corn, Dairy Cattle, Horse, Poultry, Pigs and Sheep. These lessons can be viewed at https://lancaster.unl.edu/2021-ag-festival.
Each classroom also received an Extended Learning Toolkit sponsored by the Nebraska Agriculture in the Classroom program for more hands-on learning in the classrooms. Schools participated at their own pace for this program and were offered Zoom question and answer sessions.
Malcolm 4th grade teacher Stacy Kopecky says, “We are very thankful that our students were still able to experience the Ag Literacy Festival this year. The festival is a great experience for our students, and even though they were not able to see the animals and displays in person, they had fun seeing things virtually through video presentation. The kids always enjoy the interesting facts that are shared, and it was important that they did not miss out on this opportunity to learn about ag in a different way.”
Comments from Malcolm students included:
• “I can’t believe that a dairy cow drinks 30 gallons of water a day!” — Cobi Witzel
• “It is amazing that pigs can be used for so many different things!” — Dawson Rohe