Farms for City Children is a UK registered charity which aims to provide experience of farm and countryside life for over 3,200 inner-city children per year.
Foundation
In 1976 author
Michael Morpurgo
Sir Michael Andrew Bridge Morpurgo ('' né'' Bridge; 5 October 1943) is an English book author, poet, playwright, and librettist who is known best for children's novels such as ''War Horse'' (1982). His work is noted for its "magical storytell ...
Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a British publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year. The programme involves the children spending a week at a countryside farm, during which they take part in purposeful farm work.
The first children arrived in January 1976 at Nethercott House; the charity now has three farms, in
Devon
Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devo ...
,
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean.
The county town is the city of Gl ...
stammer
Stuttering, also known as stammering, is a speech disorder in which the flow of speech is disrupted by involuntary repetitions and prolongations of sounds, syllables, words, or phrases as well as involuntary silent pauses or blocks in which the ...
who came with Farms for City Children to Devon for a week and a horse on the farm was partly responsible for inspiring the novel ''
War Horse
The first evidence of horses in warfare dates from Eurasia between 4000 and 3000 BC. A Sumerian illustration of warfare from 2500 BC depicts some type of equine pulling wagons. By 1600 BC, improved harness and chariot designs ...
''.
Aims and activities
The Farms for City Children charity describes itself thus:
"Over the years the formula has changed very little. Simply, children are involved in everything necessary to keep the farms going. They learn hands-on where their food comes from, the importance of caring for animals and the land, and the value of working co-operatively as a team. The rewards are, unusually, non-material and self-generated: children discover an active enjoyment in life and a sense of achievement, the effects of which remain with them long after they have waved the farms goodbye."
A group of 36-40 children from urban primary schools, accompanied by four or five teachers, spend 7 days on the farm, during which time the children will be split into three groups. The farm jobs are rotated so that each group does each job at least twice, with the result that the second time around the children feel "more like experienced farmers". Jobs include feeding livestock, mucking out, grooming horses and donkeys, assisting at milking time, beekeeping and working in the vegetable gardens. Naturally, many of the activities are seasonal and can include lambing in spring and making bonfires and pressing apples for juice in the autumn.
The farms
Currently the charity has three farms:
* Nethercott House, just outside the village of
Iddesleigh
Iddesleigh is a village and civil parish in the county of Devon, England. The settlement has ancient origins and is listed in the ''Domesday Book''. The village lies on the B3217 road, roughly central in its parish of around , about north of ...
in
Devon
Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devo ...
. The farm is a Grade II
listed
Listed may refer to:
* Listed, Bornholm, a fishing village on the Danish island of Bornholm
* Listed (MMM program), a television show on MuchMoreMusic
* Endangered species in biology
* Listed building, in architecture, designation of a historicall ...
Victorian building.
* Treginnis Isaf, near
St David's
St Davids or St David's ( cy, Tyddewi, , "David's house”) is a city and a community (named St Davids and the Cathedral Close) with a cathedral in Pembrokeshire, Wales, lying on the River Alun. It is the resting place of Saint David, W ...
in Pembrokeshire, Wales. Treginnis Isaf is leased from the
National Trust
The National Trust, formally the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, is a charity and membership organisation for heritage conservation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, there is a separate and ...
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean.
The county town is the city of Gl ...
, a Grade II* listed Elizabethan moated Manor House.
Funding
Farms for City Children relies on funding from charitable trusts, foundations and businesses, as well as by individual private donations and community fundraising. The charity subsidises over half the true cost of each child's place, £300 per child; in addition it needs to raise money to maintain the three historic farm properties. Over three farms for each class of 36 children, that is the equivalent of £32,400 a week. The charity's website has a shop which sells merchandise including signed copies of some of Michael Morpurgo's books, with the profits being received by the charity.
Sister organisation
An American sister charity, Farms for City Kids, was set up in 1992 by Karli and Jim Hagedorn, who had learned of Farms for City Children on a visit to the UK. Their charity's farm in
Vermont
Vermont () is a state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York to the west, and the Canadian province of Quebec to ...