By Kim Baldwin, McPherson County farmer and rancher
As the end of the school year is quickly coming into sight for my children, the end-of-year activities are beginning to ramp up. State assessments have been completed, countdowns have begun and field trips have picked up.
I recently joined my daughter’s elementary class as they expanded on their classroom lessons about pioneers and experienced a different time period for a day. Students dressed up as pioneer children, wrapped their lunch in parchment paper, packed it into metal pails and headed to Wichita to participate in a day of experiential learning.
Their earlier lessons truly came to life as these students experienced multiple aspects of what life was like for a child in Kansas more than 150 years ago.
For a portion of the morning, the students entered a restored farmhouse and learned about a variety of chores required to churn butter, fire up the kitchen stove, wash dishes and make toast. Afterwards, the students moved outside to learn about some of the tasks they would have helped with had they lived on a farm. From cutting grass using a scythe, tossing hay using pitchforks, utilizing pulley systems to move heavy objects to planting rows and rows of seed on foot, the kids soon realized that there was a lot of work involved in running a farm back in the day.
While walking by some antique farm machinery that was being explained to the kids, I couldn’t help but think that I sure was glad I live in 2025 and can utilize advanced technology and practices from planting seeds to harvesting crops.
I was soon reminded that while there have been major advancements in technology, some things still remain the same.
As the students wrapped up their lesson about all of the work required of a pioneer family to prepare for planting to harvest, we rounded a corner to discover a large display board with pegs.
The students were asked what was one thing completely out of their control that still needed to happen to increase the odds of growing a successful crop to harvest. While there were some interesting answers presented by these third graders, the main answer was rain.
The students were then each handed a hockey puck and one by one they were prompted to select a space on the peg board to release their puck. Where the puck would land would determine the crop they would have, ranging from a bumper crop all the way to a total failure.
Students cheered one another on as each child would approach the board and chose where to place their puck before releasing it to watch as it bounced from peg to peg before arriving at its final spot.
High fives and cheers were given when a puck landed on average or bumper harvests and audible sighs were heard when a puck would land in the zones deemed below average and crop failure.
You could actually see some students were quite anxious as they approached the board to find out the results of their crop. Sometimes a student would second guess their initial placement of their puck and quickly select another area of the board before releasing hoping their luck would be better by making an adjustment.
Overall, there were more successful harvests than crop failures with this group of students. Nonetheless, the exercise allowed students to briefly experience the feelings and concerns a farmer living in the late 1800s would potentially have as they grew a crop.
The day I spent with a group of pioneer kids is one I will soon not forget as it was a great reminder of the realities and concerns of farmers back then that are still present for us today.
Sometimes it takes a day in third grade to help me realize that while there have been major advancements, there are still plenty of areas that impact the success of our farms today just like those from years past.
“Insight” is a weekly column published by Kansas Farm Bureau, the state’s largest farm organization whose mission is to strengthen agriculture and the lives of Kansans through advocacy, education and service.
