Education

Forest Food Gardens: The Theory and Practice of Food Growing

Module code: X5700E
Level 5
15 credits in autumn semester
Teaching method: Seminar
Assessment modes: Essay, Group written submission

Forest gardens are a social and ecological space for growing plants for food, medicine and more.

On this module, you’ll use the campus forest food garden to connect everyday growing to global challenges. You’ll also develop practical and creative responses for climate change and biodiversity loss.

You’ll participate in:

• gardening activities such as weeding, mulching and preserving food
• sharing stories about gardens and green spaces
• working online with students in the U.S.A, fostering intercultural and teamwork skills to support global citizenship
• exploring how local communities across the world work to improve their food systems
• connecting these methods to global challenges and solutions
• exploring how these methods, including forest gardens, fit into wider food systems
• exploring how these methods relate to issues in health, the environment, the economy, politics and society.

You’ll bring ideas from your own degree and work with others across disciplines, geographical and cultural boundaries. This is a space to think about how humans depend on each other, and on other species, to survive and thrive.

Module learning outcomes

• Examine local food system actions and their global interdependencies.
• Collaborate across cultural and geographic boundaries with attention, care and collegiality.
• Appraise the contribution of food system actions in addressing social and ecological justice.
• Reflect creatively on your ideas and actions in relation to food systems, and consider any changes that you might make, individually or collectively, as a result of the module experience.