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Results are in - Lincolnshire school comes top

Ten thousand schools nationwide harvest their potato crops!

The Potato Council joined in with the celebrations at 4 schools across the country as children harvested their crops (24th June) - Park Way Primary School (Maidstone), Scampton C of E Primary School (Lincolnshire), Millbank Primary School (Cardiff) and Castleview Primary (Scotland).

There was a distinct air of anticipation as each school prepared to harvest the crops they had been carefully growing since March. The children at Park Way Primary were also joined by local grower Anthony Curwen, who helped to unearth and weigh their crops of Rocket and Vales Emerald.

Potatoes have been recognised as an important part of a healthy balanced diet for generations and, as part of the morning, the children enjoyed tasting some of the recipes made famous by the character Potato Pete, during World War II. These included Woolton Pie as well as old family recipes that had been sent in by schools taking part in the project.

Potato Pete was first made famous during World War II, by the then Minister of Food, Lord Woolton. He helped encourage the nation to grow and eat more potatoes recognising their nutritional values and versatility.

Headteacher Karen Dhanecha at Park Way Primary School said: "The children have not only had great fun growing and harvesting their potatoes – but they have learnt so much too! Nothing really beats seeing things for yourself and this has been an excellent educational activity, that has really brought how things grow to life for the children."

The schools represent just a few of the ten thousand schools across the country that have taken part in this year's project - the biggest growing project in schools nationwide. Competition to see which school has grown the heaviest weight of potatoes is bound to be fierce!

Our thanks to the schools and children who hosted the events and to Anthony Curwen, Donna Benton and George Lambert.

The results are in! Look at the crops our experts produced

Our experts harvested their crops on 24th June after 16 weeks of careful 'chitting', planting and nurturing - this is what they produced:

Rocket
Number of potatoes 47
Heaviest potato 212g
Total weight of crop 2816g

Vales Emerald
Number of potatoes 69
Heaviest potato 106g
Total weight of crop 3125g

A truly fabulous crop - how do yours compare? Don't forget to enter our schools competition - the deadline is 10th July. You could win a fantastic digital camera for your school and there are additional regional prizes as well. Submit your entry on-line - follow the link on the Teacher's Centre, and you can also mark your achievement by downloading a colourful certificate to put up in your classroom. Good luck!

Don't forget - harvest by 24th June and enter our fantastic competition!

You are almost there! Your potato plants should be thriving by now and will soon be ready for the most exciting stage of the project – harvesting!

You need to harvest by 24th June and enter our competition by 10th July. Don't forget, you need to wash and weigh your potatoes and if you have grown both Rocket and Vales Emerald, you must keep the crops separate and enter a weight per variety. To enter, follow the link in the Teacher's Centre. Good luck!

Why not really celebrate your achievement with a photo in the local paper? Getting good publicity for your school can be a valuable benefit from growing potatoes! It's often easier than you think and many schools achieved great coverage last year. We've put together useful tips and a draft press release to make it as easy as possible – follow the link in the Teacher's Centre.

A tasty dish to try at home - Pan Haggerty!

Have you tried Pan Haggerty? Our thanks go to Friskney All Saints Church of England School in Lincolnshire for supplying this wholesome recipe.

You wil need:

4 large potatoes
2 small onions
5oz mild grated cheese
salt and black pepper

Peel and thinly slice the potatoes. Put one layer of potatoes in the bottom of a glass dish. Season with salt and pepper and sprinkle over some grated cheese and onion. Continue with this until you have reached the top of the dish. The final layer should have just sliced potatoes with cheese sprinkled on it, (season). Finally cook in the oven for about 30 - 40 mins and enjoy!

Our thanks go to all the schools that supplied such a wide and varied range of family recipes.

Lumley Infant and Nursery School enjoy a Potato Day Experience!

Potato Pete was centre of attention as children from Great Lumley enjoyed a Potato Day Experience at their school on Tuesday 11th March - first prize in our prize draw competition where 6 schools were randomly selected and asked to demonstrate their commitment to healthy eating.

All 6 schools demonstrated a very high standard but Lumley Infants and Nursery were particularly impressive with their Healthy Grub Club and fantastic school garden.

As part of the prize, the children enjoyed a potato growing lesson from a local farmer before planting their own seed potatoes. It was also a fantastic opportunity to celebrate the International Year of the Potato and the children marked the occasion by colouring in flags from the top potato growing countries areound the world and sampling a delicious Ecuadorian potato dish!

Well done also to the runners up who each recieved garden centre vouchers:
Cluny Primary School, Buckie, Banffshire
Eccleston Lane Ends Primary School, Prescot, Merseyside
New Marston Primary School, Headington, Oxon
Plumpton Primary School, Lewes, East Sussex
St John Boste RC Primary School, Washington, Tyne & Wear

Enter an exciting new competition with fabulous prizes from the Sun Newspaper!

Peter Seabrook's gardening section in Saturday editions is offering the fabulous prize of a new computer, to the school that grows the greatest number of potatoes and the heaviest single potato - grown from the seed potatoes in your growing kit. Peter's column in the Sun will be regularly featuring hints and tips on growing potatoes from now until harvesting in June. To enter the Sun competition, simply follow the link on our links page or look out for more information in the Sun on Saturdays. Good luck!

Thousands sign-up for Grow Your Own Potatoes!

This year, a record number of schools are taking part in the Grow Your Own Potatoes project - the equivalent of 300,000 school children - more than ever before! Fantastic news for this special year - the International Year of the Potato.

Why not register now for Grow Your Own Potatoes 2009!

Win a free Potato Day Experience at your school!

The competition, being held to celebrate the International Year of the Potato in 2008, is part of the Grow Your Own Potatoes project 2008. This fun activity helps you to understand where food comes from, how it grows and healthy eating. It's completely free for schools to take part and you receive a fantastic growing kit complete with potato seeds and an interactive height chart. In addition, every school that registers before February 8th is automatically entered. So hurry, if you haven't already registered do it now!

Top of the Crops - Velmead Junior Hampshire, Hampshire

Congratulations to all the schools that took part in this year's competition. I hope you had as much fun growing potatoes as I did. We had a wonderful quote from a teacher in Serlby Park which I thought I would share with you as it seems to sum up what so many of you have said about the activity:

"The look on the children's faces – one of the greatest moments of my teaching career. All children should experience this!"

I am now delighted to be able to announce the winning schools in each of the following regions, Scotland, Wales, North England, Central England and South England, as well as the winner for the second seed variety.

Rocket Variety:

Winner (South England): Velmead Junior School, Hampshire - 6230g

Runner up (Central England): Curdworth Primary School - 5250g

Runner up (Northern England): Scotforth St Paul's CE Primary- 6000g

Runner up (Wales): Raglan Primary School - 2750g

Runner up (Scotland): Macmerry Primary School - 2875g

Other variety:

Overall winner (Scotland): Macmerry Primary School - 5000g Cara

Well done. We really did have some bumper crops this year. We hope you all enjoyed the experience and you'll receive your certificates shortly.

Don't forget, if you didn't win a prize this time, register your school now and you could win £50 gardening vouchers in our Grand Prize Draw!!

Please don't forget to send back your feedback forms – we really value your views and suggestions about the project.

Good Luck,

Tracy Coult
Project Manager

Nationwide Harvest Complete

Nearly 4000 schools nationwide have now harvested their crops amidst great excitement from all the school children that took part. The British Potato Council celebrated the event with a visit to Colman First School Norwich together with a local potato grower and Chris Collins the Blue Peter Gardener.

This month sees the close of the third and most successful Grow Your Own Potatoes 2007 activity to date. With nearly 4000 schools harvesting their crop nationwide, the BPC held an event at Colman First School in Norwich to celebrate the success of the campaign. The Blue Peter Gardener Chris Collins and local potato grower James Harrison helped pupils of the Colman First School Norwich lift their bumper harvest of potatoes. Chris Collins commented: "The warm spring weather and May rain has provided the perfect growing conditions so it is not surprising that the children unearthed a jumbo yield."

Nick Southgate Head of Colman First School said: "The children absolutely loved this project especially nurturing the plant and watching the miracle of growth. Growing potatoes has been great fun because it is a vegetable that children can relate to more than others and they already love eating them. I will definitely be involved in this campaign for years to come."

James Harrison BPC board member and Norfolk grower said: "This is an exceptional campaign which targets children at an influential age and educates them on the basics of the food chain. I hope more and more schools and farmers support this campaign year after year."

Registration for 2008 is in fact already underway with nearly 1000 schools registered to date. All schools that register before the 1st September will be entered in a Grand Prize Draw to win £50 gardening vouchers to help provide better gardening facilities for the start of the new school year.

Chris Collins commented: "It is great that so many schools across the country have taken part in this simple but effective project that shows kids that their food comes from the ground rather than the supermarket shelf. They have been really involved from the start chitting and planting their seed potatoes, then nurturing and watching them grow. They should now feel a real sense of achievement as they harvest their crop."

Grow Your Own Potatoes Launches!

To mark the event the British Potato Council (BPC) accompanied by Blue Peter gardener Chris Collins visited pupils at Essendine Primary School in London and helped class 3b to chit and prepare their potatoes for planting. Pupils listened intently as Chris explained how potatoes grow and demonstrated the planting process before joining in with the hands-on activity of preparing potatoes with compost.
Potato examples were handed around and placed in egg boxes for chitting. The whole school then joined in as part of its dedicated potato day; with a special assembly
jacket potatoes for lunch and an appearance from Potato Pete.
A teacher at Essendine said: The children are very excited about this project and are looking forward to planting the seed potatoes once they have chitted. The project is ideal as it fits in with the curriculum on many levels and gives the children the opportunity to learn first hand how plants grow.

You can already sign up for Grow Your Own Potatoes for 2008 by registering here. Places are limited so register early to avoid disappointment.

Grow Your Own Potatoes 2007

60% of children thought potatoes grew on trees! So, the British Potato Council launched the Grow Your Own Potatoes project for primary schools.

Bring learning to life with this hands-on activity, centered on growing a potato plant. Schools can even join in with the challenge to grow the biggest weight of potatoes for the chance to win some great prizes.

London primary school teacher, Anne Marie Nixey, said: "The Grow Your Own Potatoes scheme was a great way of bringing the countryside in to our inner city school. It linked really well with other recent class projects on healthy eating and learning about plants. The children were very excited, from planting the seed potatoes right up to harvesting, and it helped them understand the whole process of where food comes from. We’ll definitely be taking part in Grow Your Own Potatoes again."