Cumberland County Home school parents wanted their child’s education to include life skills in things like where does there food come from ?, home gardening . However, many of these parents did not have any agricultural practice skills or had limited experience themselves so, they asked the Extension Agricultural and Natural Resource agent if she would hold a class for the youth group. The extension Family and Consumer Science agent also agreed to help with the youth (23) classes under the Junior Master Gardeners group. As the parents(11) had to bring the child and in most cases was staying for the duration which was 2 hours we decided to hold a parents class on Nutrition education Healthy choices for everybody which was with the SNAP-Ed Assistant

The programs ran every 2weeks for 2 hours per day over 4 months total of 16 hours.

The programs were coordinated to complement each other and it kept the parents informed and ahead of what their child was being taught.

Many of the parents had never grown a vegetable garden but we gave them seedlings to grow at home and they came back with stories and photos of their successes and failures. The parents were enthusiastic about  learning how to plan a garden relates to how to plan a menu and what grows in what season. They all mentioned that this class developed more communication and physical activities with the whole family. They also learned how much growing their own foods could save them on the family’s budget and shared produce between families.

The successes are that many are now investing in a family vegetable garden and parents see their children being more active and engaged in physical activities proving you do not need lots of money to improve the families health and physical activities. The results of the adult behavior surveys show 100% of Adults increased their physical activities and 100% increased their fruit intake. The most impressive result was the look of amazement on parents faces when they saw their child try a new fruit or vegetable and like it when parents were sure they would not or when they saw them planting the seeds in our raised garden beds at the extension office and finding a radish or cabbage or bean plant a few weeks later.