Re-skilling activities and workshops

What some local people are interested in doing on the farm. This is the original list, created by the Rainshadow Farm Collaborative Group:

• How to grow a garden in the high desert
• How to grow and use herbs
• How to ecologically harvest herbs and regional plants
• Backyard chickens and goats
• Beekeeping in the high desert
• How to milk goats and make cheese
• Help with zoning regulations
• Composting
• Carpentry, farm and garden related or otherwise
• Practical adobe construction, including building an adobe oven.
• Building a safe and useful firepit
• Bike and auto mechanics and repair
• Culinary skills including breadmaking, making tortillas and other flatbreads.
• Healthful and affordable cooking including vegetarian and vegan cooking
• Transformation of vegan and vegetarian cooking into various cultural food traditions.
• How to make soap and candles.
• Alternative power generation
• Biodiesel and conversion of autos
• Community education nights – films, speakers, local farmers, and discussion with dinner.
• How to advertize and market products
• Clothing swap
• Book swap
• Fabric swap
• Knitting and crocheting
• Putting up (canning)
• Organizing local seed saving and sharing
• Plant-based fabrics
• Fabric arts
• Visual Arts
• Decorative arts including flower arranging
• Tactile Arts like sculpture, wood carving, stone carving, plaster molding
• Calligraphy from various cultural traditions
• Japanese tea ceremony
• Performance Art including Storytelling: cultural stories have been suggested including Sufi storytelling and musical tales, Native American stories, stories from Asia, Africa, the Middle East, old Europe (“fairy tales”), Latin American traditional tales, and other storytelling including contemporary stories. This list is not comprehensive: these are suggestions by collaborative group members who have experience with these traditions that they would be willing to share with the community.
• Learning another language
• Music from a variety of traditions
• Construction of musical instruments
• Dance
• Martial arts
• Archery
• Eco-art
• How to deliver a baby (animal or human)
• Rainshadow Farm Café!!! (Bonnie’s Brainstorm – what a concept!)

Since this list was created, we have accomplished many of these workshops. Many more have been added.

Working together.

Tags: collaborative learning, eco-farm education, re-skilling, sustainable agriculture