Farm Team
Rhode Island’s Kids First creates trading cards about their state’s farmers.
Each of 20 Rhode Island farmers are featured on their own trading card.
For generations, trading cards have been all the rage on school playgrounds. Now, Rhode Island school children are swapping a new kind of card about their state’s farmers.
The cards were created by the Rhode Island Farm to School Project, a program coordinated by Kids First, a non-profit organization focused on community-based health and wellness efforts. “The cards are a learning tool, created to get more Rhode Island-grown fruits and vegetables into our schools and connect students to the source of their food,” says Farm to School Specialist Kimberly Clark.
The cards, which feature 20 of the state’s farmers who supply their products to local schools, picture the farmer on the front and stats about the highlighted farm operation on the back. Take, for instance, the card for Pippin Orchard owner Joe Polseno (see slideshow below). His stats list such things as the orchard’s history, the type of produce he grows, and that there’s a turtle named Toby who lives in the farm’s pond.
Each of the cards also includes a quote from the featured farmer. Polseno’s is “I love getting kids involved and interested in farming when they are young. It’s so important to teach all kids where food comes from.”
To learn more about the Kids First Rhode Island Farm to School Project’s farmer trading cards, see kidsfirstri.org/newfarm.htm.
A gallery of Kids First Rhode Island’s farmer trading cards:
