It’s another beautiful day. What are you planning to do with the kids? The usual activities (including screen time) may get boring when you’re doing the same things over and over. If you’re looking for a new idea for an outing, go explore a farm!
While the city is fun and there are plenty of urban places to see and discover, mix up your routine with a different type of experience for your little ones. At the farm, they can get back to the earth, put their fingers in the dirt, and experience the novelty of a different lifestyle. Showing children another way of living expands their worldview and teaches them to appreciate the little things in life.
Say goodbye to the hustle and bustle of the city and hello to the refreshing countryside. Here are some things kids will learn and love about visiting a farm.
A Day in the Life of a Farmer
Though it seems peaceful, there is a lot of hard work that goes into maintaining a farm. Different farms serve different purposes. Farmers may raise crops or animals, produce dairy products or grow plants for nurseries. Depending on the farm, farmers have to take care of their animals, store and maintain their equipment, and sell their crops.
The jobs of a farmer are endless. They wear many hats, which is a lot more entertaining for children than visiting an office in the city. Throughout a day, a farmer may:
Tip for parents: Bring along a change of clothes, some wipes, and sanitizer—playing at the farm can get messy!
Learning on the Farm
For city kids, a farm is a whole new world. It brings a connection to the land and teaches them many new things. Farms with crops can help a child understand how plants grow and which conditions they thrive in since farmers consider seasonality when they plant their fields.
Introducing kids to botany, agriculture, and horticulture at a young age may spark a new interest for them. Kids love to learn, and what a better thing to teach than how plants grow?
For smaller children still forming a vocabulary, pointing at farm animals, buildings, and equipment helps them work on their language and comprehension skills.
Tip for Parents: Bring a list of items commonly found on a farm with you and spend the day exploring and trying to find each one.
Finding Out Where Food Comes From
Help your kids understand that while you can buy fruits, vegetables, and grains at the grocery store, that’s not actually where they come from. A farm is the origin story for many of their favorite foods. Everything we eat comes from plants or animals in some way.
Visiting a farm shows kids that farms and farmers provide us with healthy food to eat. Farmers plant seeds in the spring, help the seeds grow into plants, and then pick or harvest the crops so they can sell them to the grocery stores.
Tip for Parents: Some farms let you pick produce directly from the tree or bush (for a price). Take your little one to one of these farms and let them pick a basket of their favorite berries or apples.
Promoting Healthy Living
Visiting a farm is like going to an educational playground. Farms are usually vast and require lots of walking around. There’s room to run (and sometimes climb), ensuring that you get some activity on your visit.
Food-producing farms offer snacks that are the polar opposite of treats manufactured in a factory. Farm produce is food in the truest sense of the word; you’re hard-pressed to find anything better.
Tip for Parents: Make a list with your kids of all the food that’s found on the farm you visit and make a snack using only those ingredients.
Go Visit the Farm!
If there are different types of farms in your area that allow visitors, go see as many as you can. Your kids will love learning something new from each of these places.
Farm life may seem easygoing, but it sure is busy. Perhaps a visit to the farm will inspire you and your little ones to start a backyard or balcony garden. Maybe you’ll have a new go-to place when your kids need a break from the hubbub of the city.
What are you waiting for? Put on your mud boots! It’s time to unplug at the farm, make new friends, and enjoy the fresh air.
Have your kids been to a farm? What did they love the most?