Seed to School programme Curacao

Seed to School garden on Curacao
Gardening helps children understand how to care for living organisms, the foundations of growing, maturity, competition, cooperation and harvesting. School gardens can help the children learn better emotionally and academically.

By learning to care for and understanding the growth process a fruit or vegetable has to go through to reach maturity (ready to eat), kids will develop an understanding of nature’s importance in their lives and in the lives of other living beings. This will give the kids a greater sense of self sustainability and will boots their overall self-esteem.

Understanding the growth process, the taste and texture will also assist in positively developing the kids’ (healthier) eating habits, thus reducing the development of (childhood-) obesity.

Study has shown by introducing a routine of caring for the garden has reduced moods and eases anxiety. Caring and working together on the garden also has shown an increase in the kids’ ability to understand and share the feelings of others.

 

Seed to School programme is a hands-on (Dutch, English or Papiamento spoken) programme for kids to grow their own vegetable patch at school. We have 4 programmes to give away!
The kids will get involved in the whole growing process, from seed to fruit. Not only will they experience caring for the garden, their senses will be awakened by touching, smelling and tasting the harvested veggies by means of guided cooking sessions.

The programme includes a 30- 45 minute weekly gardening and/or cooking session for a period of 12 weeks. During these sessions the kids will get involved in the growing process of the plants and will discover tastes and textures of the vegetables grown locally.
There will be 4 planters and 2 ‘alternative’ planters available per class.
The sessions will be supported with clearly marked pictograms for easy understanding and communication.

Registration
This particular seed-to-school programme is designed for special needs children* (age 4 – 13yrs) of Curacao.
In total we have 4 programmes ( 4x classes/ group of children up to 15 pupils) to give away, please make sure you comply with the requirements before you apply.

*students who have special educational needs due to learning difficulties, physical disabilities or behavioural problems.

Submit your registration for the Seed-to-School programme.
Application window closes Friday 22 March 2019. Eligible classes will be notified in writing on Monday 25 March 2019. 

This Seed-to-School programme is proudly brought to you by our main sponsors:

Stinafo is committed to the disabled and/or chronically ill youth who often don’t receive the needed assistance to develop, even in a well developed country like the Netherlands or Curacao. The challenges often lie with the local governments as the budgets often don’t allow for this particular group.
Stinafo is here to lend a helping hand where the governmental systems can’t reach, and so this Dutch foundation reaches out to all in special needs and assists in reaching for that dream! Stinafo is proud to be sponsoring this Seed-to-School programme on Curacao.

Active Chance provides grants to those working to build better futures for the people of Curacao.
Committed to building a better future for the people of Curacao, Active Chance is proud to be part of this Seed-to-School project.
Active Chance focusses on the people and projects that are already doing good work and making a positive difference in their communities.
“We are focused on the people and projects that are already doing good work and making a positive difference in their communities but that traditionally don’t receive funding from other sources. We want to make it possible for these people to continue to do their work.”