From seed to snack: tamariki dig into kai at Kelmarna

Through Kelmarna’s Connect to Your Kai programme, Bayfield School students follow their food from seed to snack, building skills and confidence they can take home to their whānau.

Bayfield School students head off to explore the gardens at Kelmarna.

Behind the houses on Hukanui Crescent in Ponsonby, a group of Bayfield School students are watering garden beds, learning how worms keep soil healthy and finding out how bananas grow.  

The visit is part of Connect to Your Kai, a Kelmarna Community Farm challenge that encourages people to build simple, everyday habits around food, from growing your own and eating with the seasons to cooking together and wasting less. Bayfield students are one of the school groups helping shape the challenge for young people.  

From supermarket shelf to garden bed   

For many tamariki, the journey food takes to their plate is invisible. At Kelmarna, they see it first-hand. 

Students look after plants, learn what makes soil healthy and see how bananas grow, right through to the tasty end result: homemade banana chips. It’s a hands-on taste of two Connect to Your Kai habits, processing the harvest and snacking well.  

Rose Watson, a teacher at Bayfield School, says the biggest benefit is understanding the full journey of food.

"I think it's incredible for them to understand where food comes from, as opposed to just going to the supermarket, and how it is created from seed until they actually harvest it and eat it. It's been an amazing experience for our kids."

Students discover how worms turn food scraps into healthy soil.

Growing confident young cooks and growers

Behind the programme is Sarah Moss-Baker, Education Coordinator at Kelmarna Community Farm, who developed Connect to Your Kai and has worked alongside the Bayfield students throughout. 

For Sarah, confidence is at the heart of the challenge.

"It’s so important for young people to have the skills to confidently engage with kai. So kai becomes something that’s not just bought from a supermarket, but something that they can grow and prepare and feel confident to share with their whānau and friends."

The learning does not stop at the farm gate. Students leave with take-home booklets and seeds, so what they learn on the farm can keep growing at school and at home with their whānau.

More than 40 years of community growing

Kelmarna began in 1981 as a community experiment on council land. Today, it’s an organic farm, a teaching space and a gathering place in the middle of the city, open to anyone who wants to visit. 

Connect to Your Kai was funded through Te Ara Urutau Climate and Emergency Fund and Mana Ora Youth Resilience, part of the Sustainable Schools programme. That support is helping Kelmarna bring more students onto the farm and create new learning resources. 

At the end of the visit, the students thank Sarah with gifts, a small sign of the connection they’ve built with the people and place behind their food.

 Get growing  

• Take the challenge. Try Connect to Your Kai with your whānau, flat or school.
• Start at home. You don’t need a farm to connect with your kai. Learn how to get started.
• Get your school involved. Explore Sustainable Schools programmes across Tāmaki Makaurau.
• Volunteer at Kelmarna. Help out in the gardens, the shop or with education. Find a volunteer role.