Feeding Minds, Fighting Hunger
Launched on World Food Day 2000, Feeding Minds, Fighting Hunger is a global education initiative for schools and youth groups designed to enable and encourage teachers, students and young people to become actively involved in helping create a world free from hunger and malnutrition. Feeding Minds has been created by a group of 10 international partners and non-profit organisations, led by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations and the U.S. National Committee for World Food Day. These partners have collaborated to create an interactive web-based project that aims to act as a global classroom and foster interactive discussions on key aspects of hunger, nutrition and food security.
Communication Strategies
Three teaching modules for each of three levels of education - primary, intermediate, and secondary - have been developed and are available for use from the Feeding Minds, Fighting Hunger website. Designed to be easy to use by teachers around the world, each of the modules explores, with varying levels of complexity according to levels of education, the questions - Who Is Malnourished? Why Is There Hunger in the World? and What Can We Do To Help End Hunger and Malnutrition? Each lesson contains objectives, concepts and activities. Background information and additional resources are provided to assist teachers in studying these topics with their students. Teachers are encouraged to adapt and refine the materials, as necessary, to meet local needs and conditions. The lessons and teaching materials are available in Arabic, Chinese, English, Farsi, French, Greek, Bahasa Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Kiswahili. They are available on the internet, on CD-ROM, and in print form upon request. The website provides a forum through which teachers and students around the world can talk with each other and exchange ideas and experiences on these issues.
Feeding Minds, Fighting Hunger also aims to reach out directly to youth through its Youth Window, which provides information, resources and activities for young people to use on their own. Providing additional information not included in the main lessons, the Youth Window aims to interest and motivate teens inside or outside the classroom to join in global efforts to end hunger and malnutrition. The Youth Window includes facts, resources,and information about what young people can and are doing.
Feeding Minds, Fighting Hunger also aims to reach out directly to youth through its Youth Window, which provides information, resources and activities for young people to use on their own. Providing additional information not included in the main lessons, the Youth Window aims to interest and motivate teens inside or outside the classroom to join in global efforts to end hunger and malnutrition. The Youth Window includes facts, resources,and information about what young people can and are doing.
Development Issues
Hunger, Youth
Key Points
According to the project website, 850 million people in the world never get enough to eat to meet their basic energy requirements; 2 billion people cannot consume the quantity and variety of foods necessary to meet their vitamin and mineral needs. Hunger and malnutrition prevent the normal growth and development of children, limit the learning capacity and productivity of both children and adults, and, when widespread, are serious constraints to the social and economic development of communities and nations.
Partners
American Federation of Teachers (AFT), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Future Harvest, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), International Education and Resource Network (I*EARN), National Peace Corps Association (NPCA), Newsweek Education Program (NEP), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), United States National Committee for the World Food Day, The World Bank.
Sources
Feeding Minds, Fighting Hunger website, January 30 2006.
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