Wheat Planting and Threshing

September – October 

In this unique program, children learn farming from the ground up: starting in the field and ending in the kitchen! Participants begin by helping farmers prepare the ground for a crop of winter wheat: tilling the field, sowing seeds by “hand broadcasting”, and comparing this method to mechanical planting. Using Howell Farm wheat cut earlier this year, kids fast-forward to the next summer harvest – first learning how farmers bundle the stalks into sheaves, then stacking the sheaves into a free-standing “shock.”

The hands-on work continues, threshing the wheat with a flail and separating it from the chaff by winnowing with a hand-crank fanning mill. After learning how farmers would then store and process wheat – in the past and today – children finally pay a visit to the farmhouse kitchen to taste bread baked with flour ground from the same wheat grown on the farm.

Program Objectives:

Using methods and tools common in New Jersey from 1890-1910, students will plant and process the farm’s wheat crop in order to understand: 

• That planting is not only done in the spring
  
• That much of our food comes from plants grown on farms 
  
• How methods and technology change over time 
  
•  That plants, animals, and humans on the farm are interdependent
  
• How wheat is processed into food 
  

Essential Questions:

• What do farmers plant in the fall, and why?
• What does a plant do to survive the winter and how can the farmer help?
•  What simple tools can be used to turn wheat into flour?
  
• Has technology changed the way we process the wheat crop?
  
•  What are the steps required to bake bread? 

Cost & Scheduling:

– $10 per person for children ages 1+ and adults (including parents & teachers)

– Group rates for groups over 15