Outdoor taste education: Danish perspectives on potentials and challenges for taste education in school gardens and outdoor education

ABSTRACT

The article explores how taste is integrated in the outdoor educational context of school gardens. The study discusses previous research critical of taste education in general and of school garden cooking programs in particular with an empirical exploration of taste education in the Danish school garden program, Gardens for Bellies. A key finding is that, despite an absence of an explicitly formulated pedagogy of taste, tasting is a central element in triggering students’ involvement in the learning process and students are encouraged, and given autonomy to reflect and make their own taste judgments. The discussion draws on newer theoretical and didactic perspectives on taste education and concludes that a critical, reflective, and systematic approach to taste education can be key to involving students’ perspectives more radically and linking the school garden experience both to the classroom and to wider educational goals.

KEYWORDS:

• Taste education
• outdoor learning
• school gardens
• student autonomy and involvement
• critically reflected food choices

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Mithril et al. define New Nordic Diet (NND) as a diet that is palatable, environmentally friendly and based on foods originating from the Nordic region. (MITHRIL, Charlotte Guidelines for the new Nordic diet. Public health nutrition, 2012, 15.10: 1941–1947.)

2. Famous for eating chili on Danish television.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by Nordea-fonden.

Notes on contributors

Morten Kromann Nielsen

Morten Kromann Nielsen PhD is associate professor at UCL University College in Odense, Denmark. His background is in social anthropology and his research has ranged from garden-based learning to pedagogy, learning, and identity construction in the American youth food justice movement.

Pernille Malberg Dyg

Pernille Malberg Dyg PhD is associate professor at University College Copenhagen, Denmark. Her background is in environmental planning and her research has addressed community gardens, school gardens, and farm-to-school cooperation, focusing on food citizenship and links between health, wellbeing, nature connectedness, and sustainability.

Karen Wistoft

Karen Wistoft PhD is professor in Aarhus University’s Department of Education, Copenhagen, Denmark. Prior to her research on school gardens, she evaluated the impact of the Gardens for Bellies program on children’s learning and competence development. Her research relates to the school setting, student wellbeing, cooking, taste, and mental health.