New ag program established at Grand Ridge School

GRAND RIDGE, Ill. — All students at the Grand Ridge School are learning about agriculture this year with the development of an ag program at the school that includes kindergarten through eighth grade.

“This is a farming community, so they wanted to provide a program for the kids to show they could come back to the community and start a life here,” said Kylie Eike, the agricultural teacher at Grand Ridge. “This ag program is community based, so we are doing things with the community.”

Not only is the ag program new at Grand Ridge, this is also Eike’s first year as a teacher.

“I’m from Newark and I was part of the FFA chapter in high school,” she said. “My parents have a corn and soybean farm that was started by my grandpa.”

After finishing a transfer degree at Joliet Junior College, Eike went to Illinois State University to complete her degree in agricultural communications, but she had no plans to become an ag teacher.

“Both my parents are educators — my mom has been teaching kindergarten to fourth grade PE my whole life and my dad taught ag education for five years,” she said. “But I didn’t want to follow in their footsteps to be a teacher.”

However, Eike changed her mind after she took an intro to ag ed course at ISU.

“I went into Dr. Maxwell’s office and said I think I want to teach,” she said. “He said I’d be good at it, but I wanted to teach kids younger than high school.”

Once Eike learned about the new program at Grand Ridge, she was excited since it was close to home and it meant she would be working with younger students.

“I thought it was perfect and the day the job was posted, I applied,” she said.

For the new ag program at the school, Eike sees each grade for one quarter.

“For the kindergartners through fifth grade, they are in my class for two days during that quarter,” she said. “It is an Ag in the Classroom-based class, so they get a background of where their food comes from.”

The kindergarten students learned about what is a farm and what is on a farm.

“Now they are learning about how we can eat plants from the top to the bottom,” Eike said.

“They learn that a carrot is a root, celery is a stem, cabbage is a leaf and eggplant is a fruit. They also learn what you don’t eat, like the tops of carrots,” she said.

Students in fourth grade just completed a chicken unit.

“Now they are learning about wheat,” Eike said. “They will be doing a project to extract DNA from wheat.”

The students in sixth through eighth grades learn more in-depth about agriculture and about the FFA organization.

Eighth-grade students are currently studying plants and horticulture and they started a project to see the impact of planting depth when growing soybeans.

“Tomorrow we are going to look at what a complete flower looks like,” Eike said. “I try to do as many hands-on activities as I can because the kids learn better when they’re able to do something.”

On Feb. 2, the charter signing for the Grand Ridge Middle School FFA Chapter was held at the school.

“We are the only chapter in Section 7 that is middle school only,” Eike said.

The charter signing occurred during National FFA Week and the Section 7 president, Illinois FFA president and a National FFA officer attended the special event.

“We also had the IVCC president here and he talked about them growing off the knowledge they learn here, which not a lot of kids get,” Eike said. “I remember Ag in the Classroom, but other than that, I didn’t get exposure to an ag class until I was in high school.”

Two of the students at Grand Ridge have already started their FFA record books so they can exhibit their livestock this summer at the Section 7 FFA Fair.

“They will be showing pigs, cattle and goats,” Eike said. “I have a few more kids that want to show livestock next year.”

The National FFA Organization allows seventh- and eighth-grade students to be members of the organization.

“Anything the FFA chapter does at school, the sixth-graders can participate in, but only the seventh- and eighth-graders can wear the blue jacket,” Eike said.

The FFA adviser’s goal is for all her FFA members to have a record book.

“Our science teacher requires all the seventh- and eighth-graders to do a science fair project,” Eike said.

“Some of the kids did projects this year that would fit into the ag umbrella, so I would love it for the kids to use those projects for FFA, too,” she said.

Eike has spent quite a bit of time during this first year of the ag program explaining the FFA organization to the students.

“Our principal, Terry Ahearn, and I have talked about starting slow to build a good foundation and then the rest will come easier,” she said.

A middle school FFA chapter is more challenging, Eike said, than a high school chapter.

“I try to do a lot of our activities during the school days like FFA meetings because I don’t want the kids to be unable to come because they don’t have someone to drive them” she said. “So, we hold our meetings during recess or study hall.”

Last fall, the Grand Ridge Middle School FFA Chapter did a community leaf rake project.

“The school has done this before and we divided the kids into groups and they went out and raked leaves,” Eike said. “I require all the FFA members to do at least one FFA activity, either a meeting or an event.”

In June, Eike will attend the Illinois FFA State Convention where Grand Ridge will be recognized as a new chapter.

“I am undecided if I will be taking kids to the state convention,” she said. “I want them to experience the FFA world, but I also want to ease into it.”

Eike is also looking forward to the next school year.

“We didn’t compete in any FFA contests this year, but I have a list from the kids of contests they want to compete in next year,” she said.

The ag teacher has received a lot of support during the first year of the program.

“The teachers, administration, community and parents have been really great,” Eike said.

“I’m busy, but I’m excited,” she said. “Ag teachers embrace the chaos.”