Walnut Grove Elementary School Raises Awareness of Hunger with Fun

Carroll ISD fourth graders create interactive games and a 3D display to advocate for North Texas Food Bank.

Students at Walnut Grove Elementary School played tic-tac-toe, matched dominoes and tried their hand at Jeopardy last week – all in the name of fighting hunger.

As part of the Carroll ISD school’s Gifted & Talented fourth-grade class, students were challenged with creating an interactive event that raised awareness of food insecurity while utilizing the canned goods that had been donated as part of the PTO’s spring food drive.

Quest-GT Specialist Lisa Timmerman says she always asks her students to finish the year with a capstone project that showcases everything they’ve learned, and this year she wanted them to apply their knowledge to philanthropy and increasing awareness of hunger in their community.

^{Lisa Timmerman and Brandon Boling.}

Before the kids got started, she invited North Texas Food Bank Senior Program Specialist Brandon Boling to speak about the Food Bank and the need for access to nutritious food in North Texas.

Armed with that information, and additional data they learned from reading NTFB’s website, the students created hunger-related versions of dominos, basketball, tic-tac-toe, jeopardy, a puzzle and more.

By matching dominos, people could learn how many meals NTFB distributes daily (around 400,000) and by shooting mini-basketballs, they could learn how many children face hunger in North Texas (1 in 5).

Cans that had been donated to the PTA’s food drive were used to create walls between each game so that participants had a space to play. They were also used to create two 3D sculptures—a project that was inspired by NTFB’s annual Canstruction event, which returns this year, Sept. 14-Oct. 6, at NorthPark Center.

One team of students designed and printed stickers relating to hunger awareness, and two students created a flyer with a QR code that made it easy for people to donate to NTFB.

After the event, the nearly 1,000 cans that had been collected were donated to NTFB.

Kathleen Petty is a communications manager for the North Texas Food Bank.