How can my students gain an awareness of agriculture and also improve their reading skills? Jo Conrad, a 3rd and 4th grade teacher from Dodge Public School in Dodge, Nebraska, found a unique way to connect agriculture with her school districts' goals and the State Standards. The objective was to increase the reading fluency, comprehension and note taking of each student. Through her innovative ideas, the students became excited about reading and agriculture.

Jo purchased the Crop and Livestock Cards developed by the Nebraska Agriculture in the Classroom Program. Each student had a notebook including the cards, seeds, and the reading passages from the back of the cards. The students would practice reading from the cards for one minute. Toward the end of the week, each student would read a passage for one minute to their teacher. The students errors would be recorded, the number of words read and finally the students would recall the information from the passage. What a great way to immerse students with information about crops and livestock, but meet the school districts' goals, increase reading fluency and ultimately meet the State Standards.

Jo not only inspires her students in the classroom, but also presents at state and national conferences, county fairs and encourages other teachers to include agriculture in their daily lesson plans. As Jo would say, "Reading + Agriculture + Students = State Standards."