Lianne van Rulo-Vermue was one of the parents involved in organising the Food Festival. Together with two other parents, she made a plan for the Food Festival and arranged all kinds of practical matters for putting on the festival. Lianne is also an educational farmer. Grades 1 through 5 visited her arable farm.

A helping hand from parents

Lianne: “As an educational farmer, I think it is very important that children know where their food comes from before it ends up on their plates. And once they know that, I hope food waste will decrease. When I heard that my children’s primary school had applied for the Lekker naar Buiten! grant, but that the teachers were short of time when it came to spending it, I offered to help.”

Healthy lunch workshop

The Lekker naar Buiten! grant was initially used to pay a guest teacher who taught pupils in grades 6, 7 and 8 how to prepare a healthy lunch. This lunch consisted of wraps with chickpeas and lettuce. Banana pancakes, crunchy vegetables and fruit-infused water were also part of this healthy lunch. Of course, this knowledge had to be put into practice, and so the school came up with the idea of a Food Festival. The children were allowed to prepare everything they had learned at school for the Food Festival and sell it to family and friends there.

Visit to an educational farm: baking bread

Lianne: “Together with two other parents, a plan was drawn up for this Food Festival. We discussed it with the teachers and then started organising it. Pupils in grades 1 through 5 came to my farm for a guest lesson about arable farming. During this visit, they were given a tour and learned how bread is made. They were allowed to taste wheat grains and onions and eventually bake and taste the bread themselves. They all liked that bread so much that it was later also made at school and sold during the Food Festival.”

Grade 3 of CBS de Lichtboei also visited the local weekly market. The pupils played healthy bingo, in which they had to find the healthy products pictured on their bingo cards at the market.

Food Festival: stalls with homemade healthy products

The pupils were allowed to put everything they had learned at school about healthy nutrition into practice during the Food Festival. Each class had its own stall with homemade products. Lianne: “Before the festival, we did the shopping and set everything up together with the teachers. The school has a small kitchen, so we could prepare the food there. The younger children handed out apple tray bake at their stall, grade 4 had banana smoothies, grade 6 had wraps with homemade hummus, and grade 7 had fruit-infused water and banana bread. The recipes were shared with the parents afterwards. The visitors were very positive about the festival, and the children even more so. I would recommend an event like this to every school, but I would not organise it every year. It takes a lot of time to organise, and if you hold it every other year, it becomes extra special.”

Practical information

The guest teacher for grades 7 and 8, who explained how to prepare a healthy lunch, was paid for with the Lekker naar Buiten! grant. The farm visits by grades 1 and 2 were also financed from the grant, as were the aprons worn by all the children during the Food Festival. The school had a sponsor for the remaining costs.

Get started yourself!

Would your school also like to organise a Food Festival? Take a look at the plan, recipe booklet and flyer created at CBS de Lichtboei for inspiration.