Teach Children about Wild Food
While I lived in my wilderness homestead for 13 years, I used the opportunity to educate myself as to which plants growing wild around me could be used for food.
Linda picking lamb’s quarters
in the early days.
Once I figured out that many of the “weeds” that grew so fast and seemed to be everywhere I looked were actually tasty and nutritious, my eyes were opened to the wealth of food growing literally right under my fingertips. I became very knowledgeable about them because I wanted to be certain that my family was never going to have a food shortage. Free food, growing in (too much!) abundance was all around us. Thank goodness!
When I came out of the wilderness with all that important information, I spent a while trying to figure out how I could best communicate the wild food data I had learned. I knew that what I’d discovered was valuable information and at the time, very few others were promoting the use of the wild food resources that are all around us.
Back then (early 1980s), the food situation wasn’t nearly as troubled as it is now. Even so, thousands of people came to see me: in my classes, in my presentations to various organizations, in my wild food identification walks, and they valued the few materials I could offer at the time.
Invariably the children would become even more interested in the whole wild food experience than their parents. For them it was just a fun game of playing in the flowers, and the dirt, and the plants, and that was something they could become very enthusiastic about. I have many stories to tell about teaching the children, but the most poignant one is the story of James, my Irish student, which I have related in my “Linda and the Children” page.
That was a most heartfelt experience, because it made me realize how valuable the data I had accumulated was, and that it was my duty and responsibility to spread the information as far and as wide as I could, for everyone, but most especially for the children.
For that reason I have compiled the Wild Food Homeschool Teaching Guide. This Guide is the centerpiece of our new Wild Food Homeschool Package, and uses my materials so that I can ensure the information presented is accurate, and useful, to younger foragers. Each piece of wild food information the teacher presents is followed by fun, informative, and creative activities to aid in mastery of the essential aspects of wild food that are identification, storage and preparation.
I hope that my hard-won wild food information will be put to very good use for the children. And in fact, I would love to see a new food slogan sweep the world that declares