SALEM — From tangelos to Asian pears to bunches of broccoli, Bentley School students are getting something to chew on.
Four to five times a week, students in all grades are enjoying a piece of fresh fruit or a vegetable, thanks to a grant.
In Tricia Whitten's first-grade classroom, the produce is part of interdisciplinary lessons in which her students not only eat it but also measure the food, describe it, learn its origin, write about it and create related art projects.
"It's much more fun for them to learn hands-on," Whitten said. "I try to wrap all the content areas into it, like literacy and math."
Many of Whitten's students are not native English speakers, so the produce helps to augment their vocabulary with English household words — not just academic ones.
"We had apples, which exposed them to the different parts," Whitten said, "like the core, flesh and the skin."
Whitten's students hail from countries including Bangladesh, Guatemala, Ghana, Morocco and the Dominican Republic.
"It's a great opportunity for them to try new things they don't see at home," said Marta Garcia, an English as a Second Language teacher who works with students in Whitten's class. "They get to practice domestic words about textures and flavors. We have to introduce the domestic language in the classroom."
The Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program is run by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and administered by the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.
Salem School Food Services secured the grant SEmD more than $37,000 — awarded to Bentley and Carlton elementary schools, where roughly 65 percent of children qualify for free and reduced-price meals.
"Some of the children come from very low-income families," Garcia said, "and they're not exposed to some foods or diets that have a lot of fruits and vegetables."
Many children bring junk food for snack time, and this program, in a small way, helps to counter that, Whitten said.
"Every single one is given a piece," she said. "They have to try it."
Students in Whitten's class were presented with broccoli florets on a recent morning. Some of them eyed the broccoli skeptically and sniffed it before gingerly taking a nibble.
"At the beginning, they were very reluctant to try new things," Garcia said. "It's not in a bag; it's not processed, so they were very reluctant at first."
Kayla Demers, 7, rattled off all the produce she has tried at school.
"Grapes, broccoli, grape tomatoes, oranges, pears ..." she said.
"They are like sponges for information," Whitten said of her first-graders.
Whitten's students do worksheets and art projects with the produce, like watercolor paintings of oranges and pieces of red cloth glued to look like apples.
"We get to taste them and then we do a project," Kayla said. "It's OK because it's kind of fun and stuff because you get to glue and write, and I like to write."
Classmate Jayson Fallis echoed her enthusiasm.
"I got to eat broccoli," said Jayson, 7. "It's fun because we get to do a lot of gluing and writing."
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