Kansas Corn and Kansas Beef Offer Breakout Box Lesson

New Corn and Beef Education Activity

Kansas Corn and Kansas Beef partnered to create the “Do You Know Your Moo?” Breakout Box, an educational activity focused on beef and corn. The activity utilizes a breakout box, which is an educational tool like an escape room. This learning format brings engagement and excitement to the classroom and is becoming a popular teaching tool at many schools.

The activity, for middle school and high school students, is designed to provide basic knowledge of the beef industry and the role corn plays. It satisfies Next Generation Science Standards, while providing a fun game-like experience for students. The lesson dives into concepts of common breeds of cattle, the beef life cycle, products made from beef, beef cuts and facts about grain-finished and grass-finished beef. All teachers can access the activity online at no cost. Schools that already have breakout boxes can access the “Do You Know Your Moo?” resources online at kscorn.com. Kansas Corn provides breakout boxes to schools that request a professional development workshop.

The Kansas Corn STEM education program is focused on science educators, while Kansas Beef’s education program is focused on Family and Consumer Sciences (FCS) educators. This activity is applicable for both groups of teachers and helps expand the discussion of the both industries across different classroom formats. This is what makes it such a great resource according to Kansas Corn Commission Director of Education, Sharon Thielen, PhD.

“The use of breakout boxes in the classroom is a new and exciting resource. Adding an activity focused on beef provides yet another topic for teachers to discuss and allows for cross-curricular applications as it can be used by many teachers,” Thielen said. “This activity gets students excited to learn, which makes it easy to integrate into teachers’ lesson plans.”

Kansas Beef Council Director of Nutrition, Abby Heidari, RDN, LD, explains the importance of providing an introduction to beef production while highlighting the research and science beef farmers and ranchers use from pasture to plate.

“Connecting students with accurate information about where their food comes from may help them filter through conflicting advice about what a healthy diet is in the future,” Heidari said.

This summer, at the Kansas Farm Bureau’s STEM Workshop and at Kansas Corn STEM’s Seed to STEM 2.0 summer workshops, teachers were trained on how to use this activity in their classrooms.

The “Do You Know Your Moo?” Breakout Box activity is part of a larger offering of STEM-based lessons, materials and workshops for K-12 teachers provided by Kansas Corn STEM and supported by the Kansas Corn Commission. Visit kansascornstem.com for more information.

Kansas Beef’s education program provides school food service resources and resources for family and consumer sciences teachers. kansasbeef.org/more-information/beef-in-schools.

Get more information and request a professional development workshop from Kansas Corn at kscorn.com/breakout-box/