When the time came to choose a senior FFA project, a requirement for members of the Decatur FFA Chapter in Texas, Lauren Hanna wanted to draw from two key experiences: her love of agriculture, specifically showing heifers, and the support she received as a second grader who struggled with reading.
Her solution to combine the two? Read books about agriculture to local second graders, then gift them the books to take home. “I liked the idea of helping others with reading like people had helped me while also promoting agriculture,” she says.
Throughout the 2022-23 school year, Hanna has visited four second-grade classrooms at nearby Carson Elementary one Friday every six weeks. Each time she brings a different book about farming and the food system. Hanna selected a total of six books before she kicked off her project and has read and given them away in the following order:
- “How Did That Get in My Lunchbox? The Story of Food” by Chris Butterworth
- “Milk: From Cow to Carton” by Aliki
- “John Deere, That’s Who!” by Tracy Nelson Maurer
- “Farmer Will Allen and the Growing Table” by Jacqueline Briggs Martin
- “Can-do Cowkids” by Amanda Radke
- “Little Joe” by Sandra Neil Wallace
She has donated books to each second-grade student and teacher at Carson, as well as the school libraries at the district’s remaining elementary schools, for a total exceeding 500. Books have been supplied through grants, a partnership with a nearby literacy nonprofit, and local organizations and individuals, along with friends and family. Inside every book is a nameplate noting a specific donor who helped bring this project to life.
“I’ve gotten a lot of support from the beginning,” Hanna says. “Every time I go, everyone gets so excited. The kids are always happy to take home the books, and the school [faculty and staff are] excited too.”
Hanna adds that the engagement with students has been enjoyable for her too. “Once I asked them what their favorite vegetable was, and one yelled out, ‘Strawberries!’ That was really cute and fun.
“And it’s cool to learn about their families’ connection to agriculture,” she says, which includes full production ranches, raised vegetable beds and chicken coops. “[The classes are] about half and half with knowledge of [farming and agriculture], but they all seem to grasp it and want to learn more.”
Hanna’s ag advocacy literacy project will wrap at the end of the school year as she leaves for college to study to be a large-animal vet. However, she’d love to see it continue — potentially with more schools and more books. “The whole thing has been such a good experience,” she notes. “And it really does improve [the kids’] confidence and their skills, and hopefully they will fall in love with agriculture like me and become active in FFA in the future.”
