What’s On Your Plate? Curriculum

The What’s On Your Plate curriculum is a companion to What’s On Your Plate? film, a witty and provocative documentary produced and directed by award-winning filmmaker Catherine Gund about kids and food politics. Filmed over the course of one year, the film follows two eleven-year-old African-American city kids as they explore their place in the food chain. Sadie and Safiyah take a close look at food systems in New York City and its surrounding areas. With the camera as their companion, the girl guides talk to each other, food activists, farmers, new friends, storekeepers, their families, and the viewer, in their quest to understand what’s on all of our plates.

Just as Sadie and Safiyah embark on a journey to discover the origins and impacts of their food, The What’s On Your Plate? curriculum invites you to learn alongside them with hands-on activities, easy to read information and investigatory projects to get your students thinking creatively and critically about what food means to their community and beyond. Presented as an adaptable resource for both teachers and non-formal educators the objective is to use systems thinking and project-based learning to spark a dialogue and relationship with your students about the interconnections of food, local ecology, health, and community. Inside you’ll find three modules exploring issues related to school food, health and access to food and local food. The curriculum also works together with the What’s On Your Plate? film providing a crucial media learning tool for cultivating discussion and a deeper understanding of the complex and hidden world of food politics through unique narratives, interviews and more.

More information go to whatsonyourplateproject.org