Guest Post by Becky of kidworldcitizen

6 LESSON PLANS TO TEACH YOUR KIDS ABOUT HUNGER AND GLOBAL FOOD INSTABILITY:

1. Heifer International offers a wonderful visual lesson about our nation’s resources. “When is Enough, Enough?” on page 5 of this pdf on Feeding 5000 uses cups of cereal demonstrate the basic resources of the Earth, who is consuming most of them, and who is left in poverty.

2. Look at the Food and Agricultural Organization of the UN (FAO)’s Map of World Hunger. Choose a country that is red (more than 35% is malnourished) and research what factors contribute to the food instability. For example: drought, other natural disaster or environmental factor, political situation, war, famine, food shortages, etc.

3. Learn about food insecurity in Nigeria, India and Guatemala (and the US!) through the Pulitzer Center’s free lesson plans (pdf).  Watch their videos, listen to the radio streams, use their post-video discussions and extension activities to explore hunger on a global and local level. Classes are encouraged to host an awareness event and even connect with the journalists via email, skype or in-school visits. What an amazing opportunity!

4. Host an OxFam Banquet, where a small percentage of students enjoy a lavish, abundant meal, some students have a decent meal with no extras, and a large group of students eat rice and drink water. OxFam offers a free toolkit for schools with discussion questions, promotional materials, and fact sheets.

5. Read Church World Services’ (CWS) “Hungry Decisions” story, about a man (or woman) trying to survive in a rural area of a developing area. The story is similar to the Choose Your Own Adventure books, in that every page ends with 2 choices; you must choose how the story continues by making the (sometimes) difficult decisions. There are lots of opportunities to discuss with your kids!

6. Use the lesson plans at Rice Bowls to teach your children about hunger in several interdisciplinary lessons. The free, downloadable lessons are broken into grade-level and subject matter, with with easy to follow descriptions.

Moms Fighting Hunger is a group of bloggers committed to raising awareness about hunger by sharing concrete ideas that get entire families involved, especially to teach kids about hunger.