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A private school here has agriculture curriculum to help out students get a grasp of the life cycle of plants and rice.

The Temple Hill International School (T.H.I.S.) wants to help students get a deeper understanding about the food processes from germination to transplanting and watching them grow and caring for them until harvest time.

“Although farming is part of the curriculum, they don’t get grades from planting rice. It is an extra subject,” high school principal Mebruhtu Zemui Tesfazghi said. “They plant rice as a group, but they raise vegetables individually,” he added.

Among the plants the students grow in the verdant plots are squash, onion, pandan, eggplants, taragon tea, patola (gourd) and sweet potatoes or kamote.

The philosophy behind this is to help students acquire a deeper understanding about the life cycle of plants and rice.

Later, seeds are gathered from the new harvests to be used for the next planting season.

Students are not only taught to plant and harvest rice but to cook it as well, along with the abundant vegetable harvests. (PNA) DCT/JCA