Seeds of inspiration were planted in Inglewood’s Kelso Elementary School yesterday as stars from Hollywood, Sports heroes, and other inspirational figures gathered to plant The Teaching Garden, the first of 1000 gardens to be planted in a national program that is dedicated to nutrition and fitness education for elementary school children.

Along with Teaching Garden founder and Hollywood philanthropist Kelly Meyer, professional volleyball player Gabrielle Reece, LA Laker Derek Fisher, Iron Chef’s Cat Cora and actor Tobey Maguire were on hand yesterday to launch the program and help 700 elementary students understand the importance of good nutrition and fitness.

Inspired by First Lady Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” campaign, Kelly Meyer created the Teaching Garden to reinforce these ideals by creating a living laboratory. In this garden, students, through the simple process of putting a seed into the earth, nurturing it and ultimately harvesting the food, will learn through hands-on exploration of life sciences, to make positive choices for health and fitness.
The principles of the Teaching Garden are to create a network of 1000 schools within the next two years who will have implemented the program, sharing curriculum, ideas and communicating with each other.  This will occur through a partnership with www.takepart.com.

Yesterday, the Farmer-Veteran Coalition, a team of trained organic farmers, helped the kids plant the gardens.
The children then took part in a nutrition/cooking class with Iron Chef’s Cat Cora, participated in a fitness demonstration with Gabby Reece and listened to a discussion on the importance of nutrition as an athlete with Derek Fisher. Tobey Maguire spoke about healthy food choices and encouraged kids to demand that their schools provide healthy alternatives by writing letters to their principals.

All the children, staff and participants enjoyed NeuroAqua on a very sunny Californian day that showed all involved what community means and its power to affect change.

All Photos by Sean F. Zanni.