The Chestermere Public Library taught youth in the community food literacy with a new gardening program.
The library, in partnership with local gardeners Jen Peddlesden and Pat Shaw, taught youth how to grow their own zucchini, with the opportunity to showcase what they grew at the Chestermere Country Fair.
“We’re trying to promote gardening knowledge, and food literacy especially among kids,” Chestermere Public Library Community Librarian Jackson Longworth said.
In March the library gave out 100 zucchini kits which included soil, seeds, a step-by-step instruction book on how to grow the zucchini, a diary to keep track of the progress, and information on how to enter the zucchini to the Red Ribbon Competition at the Country Fair.
The library partnered with the Chestermere Country Fair organizers to create a special category in the Red Ribbon Competition to see how the zucchinis turned out.
“Some of the zucchinis were huge, absolutely massive,” Longworth said. “It was the first time we tried it, it was really successful, and we did end up with entries at the country fair which we were happy about. This is definitely something we’re looking into doing again next year.”
The library also featured guest speakers to talk to youth about gardening, compost worms, and pollinators.
“It was a great event. Jen Peddlesden brought in composting worms and showed them to the kids, and we had a local bee expert come in to talk about pollinators,” Longworth said.
Chestermere Food Bank President Laurie Dunn also stopped by the library to talk about different ways to cook zucchini and hand out zucchini brownies.
“There were a lot of people who came to the events, and it was a really positive experience,” Longworth said.
The library was inspired to offer the gardening program to youth in the community because it teaches youth where their food comes from while building general gardening skills and knowledge.
“It was a really positive experience. We’re happy to be doing events like this that bring people into the library in new ways that helps fulfil our goal of the library being a community hub,” Longworth said. “The library is helping educate people on literacy beyond just the ability to read or the ability to write, but literacy of food knowledge and gardening knowledge.”
