Sherry Metzger

Metzger’s innovative teaching idea, “Foodology: The Science of Food and Grocery Shopping”, is designed to give the 420 Kindergarten through fifth-grade students a real-world experience where they can engage in hands-on shopping and problem solving in a mock grocery store they create in an empty classroom. The grocery store will go beyond creative play, giving the students a chance to touch and inspect products on the shelves and solve real-life problems related to nutrition; purchasing and marketing; construction and layout; and math concepts and computation. Knowledge about a variety of important factors will be shared, including analyzing the connections between food and health, understanding the importance of creating healthy menus, recognizing the connections between food choices and obesity, as well as budgeting, interpretation of labels and flyers, comparison-shopping, and food production, transportation and marketing. Additionally, students will learn how current events like hurricanes, droughts, freezes, strikes, and gas prices impact food prices at the store. Metzger, who lives in San Antonio, hopes her program will help her students become smart shoppers who focus on healthy choices.