What was your driving question?
How can we address the food insecurity issues that some of our community members face?
Grades Involved
3rd
How did this project connect to your local or regional community?
This project is working to address food/basic need scarcity within some of our community’s families.
What PBE principles were highlighted in this project?
Learner-Centered, Design Thinking, Community as Classroom, Interdisciplinary Approach, Inquiry Based
Project Description
After investigating the global impact of food scarcity, a discussion was had within the classroom as to how and why some of our local community members face the same challenges. The students decided that they could help assist these families by building “blessing boxes” to place around town. The boxes would contain donated non-perishable food items, hygiene items, and basic living supplies and would be stocked by local donors, churches, and community members. This project is an ongoing interdisciplinary project that truly involves the entire community and is designed and completed by the students through the design-thinking process.
How did this positively impact the community? How was it shared?
The 3rd graders made request videos that were posted on social media asking the community for support and partnership donations for the blessing boxes. The local media was contacted, and we are hoping that they will advertise these boxes as well. The students are also planning to study the impact this project has on the community, but it has not been in place long enough to gauge the impact.
Reflection: What was the biggest challenge? What was the most rewarding aspect of this project?
The biggest challenge has been the initial start-up/building of the blessing boxes. The logistics behind this project were tedious, but oh-so-worth-it. The most rewarding aspect is knowing that we are helping out fellow community members.
Any advice for a teacher or student that is implementing a PBE project for the first time?
“Your first step is to see what the community needs, and then you figure out a solution for that need. If it’s important to your community, you should take your time and not rush through the project.” – Madison
“If you’re going to do a community project, you need to see what you can do to help others first. Then organize it with your groups. Also, getting others involved with your project makes it better. And if it doesn’t work, keep trying to complete the project anyway!” – Constanza
