News / Events

Community Literacy Update

The Ground to Griddle Neighbourhood Kitchen has added learning sessions to our program that continue to support informal literacy skill development and that also encourage a culture of lifelong learning and sharing. In September kitchen participants went on a wild berry picking field trip to harvest highbush cranberries and rosehips and, as well, had several community members come to share food/cultural skills.
After a local, organic gardener donated 120 pounds of cabbage to our kitchen, we invited local sauerkraut making guru, Karen Diemert, to share her sauerkraut making skills with us. Armed with shredders, cabbage, crocks and counter space our crew of twelve hand shredded, tamped and seasoned seventeen gallons of sauerkraut! We had to use a truck to move the largest crock! Gail Jenne kindly offered up her spare room for the six weeks fermentation period needed for the cabbage to transform to sauerkraut. And now, just in time for Christmas, the sauerkraut is ready. We had our first tasting at the kitchen and the remainder has been jarred up for participants to take home to eat or to give as gifts.
In October, local First Nations elder, Lillian Morris, began sessions at the kitchen teaching participants beading/leather working skills. Our initial project has been making a medicine bag and Elke Heinemann-Pesch kindly donated several types of hide from the Northwest Territories for us to use. Beading has proven to be very popular and many participants have continued to work on their projects at home during the week.
Literacy Outreach continues on Wednesdays at 11am at the Salvation Army Soup Kitchen. I bring my guitar to these sessions and have discovered that playing music or others borrowing my guitar and playing a tune is a great way to meet people! I let people know about the services offered at Community Learning and find out their literacy needs.
December has seen lots of planning for upcoming Literacy Month in February 2011. The kick off day is January 27th, 2011, National Literacy Day. The theme for this year’s literacy month is “Play for Literacy” and several fun community events have been planned in conjunction with the Smithers Public Library, Northwest Community College, School District #54 and other community partners. Stay tuned for the Literacy Month calendar to be published in the Interior News with details about these upcoming events.