Agri-Business Child Development

Seneca County Head Start

Agri-Business Child Development (ABCD) has provided services to Migrant and Seasonal farm worker families and children and other rural poor since 1946. As a non-profit provider of comprehensive childhood development services for infants, toddlers, and preschoolers, the agency serves on average 1,700 children in twenty rural New York State counties. In Seneca County an average of 100 children are served.

The mission of the Agri-Business Child Development is to foster the optimal social, intellectual and physical growth of the children of Migrant, Seasonal and local farmworkers and Seneca Head Start families. The agency continually strives to provide the best early childhood services possible. Core agency values are a deep and abiding respect for families and their labor, love and commitment to children, enthusiasm for creating a learning environment which supports children, parents and staff and valuing all aspects of diversity, ABCD’s commitment to parent involvement, human resource development, and quality improvement assure the on-going growth of program services at the center.

Seneca County Cornell Cooperative Extension partners with Seneca County Head Start to support the ABCD mission. This is accomplished by providing nutrition/physical fitness education programs to the children at the Seneca County Head Start program each month throughout the school year. Children learn about nutrition and fitness by using www.mypyramid.gov resources. A certified “Food Stamp Nutrition Education (FSNE)/ Eat Smart New York (ESNY)” CCE Educator teaches the lesson with the involvement of Head Start teachers and teacher’s aides.  Parents are always invited to be part of the interactive lesson.

The children truly enjoy and learn from each lesson presented. This is evidenced by their retention of the lesson learned when reviewed by the CCE Educator at her next visit. To see the lesson materials used scroll down to “Seneca County Head Start Nutrition/Physical Fitness Lessons”.

The program is a collaborative effort between Seneca County Head Start and Cornell Cooperative Extension’s “Eat Smart New York (ESNY)/ Food Stamp Nutrition Education (FSNE) programs. Eat Smart New York programming is presented to the parents through ESNY marketing materials taken home by the children. Parents are advised that they may attend an ESNY program during the hours their children attend school. Transportation from Seneca County Head Start is offered by Seneca County CCE.

Seneca County CCE is an active member of the Seneca County Head Start Health Service Advisory Committee (HSAC).  To learn more about Seneca County CCE’s involvement with Seneca County Head Start contact Debra DiLallo, Family Resource Educator. (Link to CCE staff directory.) For more information on Seneca County Head Start, 115 West Bayard Street, Seneca Falls, NY phone 315-568-8774.

Seneca County Head Start Nutrition/Physical Fitness Lessons:

• Homemade Peanut Butter
• Different Types of Bananas
• Fresh Squeezed Orange Juice
• Fresh Carrots
• The Largest Seed Known – A Coconut
• A Fruit Called a Mango
• Baby Spinach
• Homemade Butter
• Fresh Pineapple

Recommended Additional Resources Enjoyed by Children:

The above listed lessons were enhanced with colorful pictures using the book titled In The Garden; (Scholastic Inc., ISBN 0-439-33637-6) or Lunch at the Zoo; (Little Cottage Books, Tallahassee, Fla., ISBN 0-9728732-0-1)