Renewable Energy
Check out ways agriculture contributes to renewable energy and reducing carbon emissions. Click here for more on ethanol.
Reading Materials & Ag-tivities
- PK – 2nd Grade
- 3rd – 5th grades
- Middle/High School
Videos
Category: Ag in the Classroom
Wheat – from Field to Flour
Online Reading Materials
- Wheat Ag Mag
- AgVenture Worksheet – goes with Wheat Ag Mag
- Wheat Reader
- Wheat Facts for Little Readers
Ag-tivities
Wheat Recipes to Try
Wheat Videos
Let’s Get Poppin’
See what’s popping with Illinois’ official state snack – popcorn!
Popcorn Reading & Ag-tivities
- PK – 2nd Grade
- 3rd – 5th Grade
- Middle/High School
Visit popcorn.org for more great lessons, science experiments & ideas
Books to Read – set up a FREE account on www.openlibrary.org to read these online books for FREE! Or contact us to check out books from our AITC library!
Popcorn Videos
Ag is Essential!
Agriculture is all around us – providing food to eat, clothes to wear and so much more! McLean County (IL) teachers can request Ag is Essential activity kits for their classroom: Click here
Reading Materials
Learning Ag-tivities:
- PK – 2nd grade
- 3rd – 5th grade
- Barn Book “Zine” (2nd-3rd grade)
- Plot-A-Lot
- Ag is Everywhere Word Scramble
- Futures Farming
- 6th – 12th Grade
- Find more General Agriculture lessons here!
Books to Read – set up a FREE account on openlibrary.org to read these online books for FREE! Or contact us to check out hard copies of these or similar books.
- Farming by Gail Gibbons
- How Did That Get in My Lunchbox? by Christine Butterworth
Farming Videos
Teachers Explore Fields of Opportunity
Fifteen local teachers had the chance to explore “Fields of Opportunity” with a focus on agricultural careers at the2021 Summer Ag in the Classroom Workshop held in early June.
“Agriculture offers more than 300 career fields,” says Bridget Caldwell, McLean County Ag in the Classroom coordinator. “We want to provide teachers with experiences and resources to connect agriculture to the subjects they teach.” 
Tours and hands-on experiences offered ways for teachers to incorporate food and farming with science, technology, engineering, math and literature learning standards.
Participants toured a variety of farms and ag-related businesses including Dean’s Bacon & Beef, 4 Peanuts Produce, O’Rourke Family Gardens, Epiphany Farms, der Bauernhof Farms, Illinois State University Research Farm, Finding Eminence Farm, King Farms, Illinois State University Horticulture Center, Fell Arboretum, Yuton Elevator and Rader Family Farms.
Teachers also had the chance to drive a tractor or combine courtesy of Birkey’s Farm Store.
The workshop provided teachers with professional development credit hours and the option to earn two hours of graduate level credit through University of St. Francis.
Katie Buckley, University of Illinois Extension Educator, McLean County helped coordinate
the workshop. To learn more about Extension’s STEAM in the Classroom program, click here.