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Rutabaga. Star fruit. Jicama. Uglifruit. A lot of adults would have a hard time even identifying any of these in a fruit-and-vegetable lineup.
But not Louis Martinez, even though the first time he held a star fruit, he didn’t know what to make of it.
“It made me laugh,” said Louis, a 10-year-old third-grader at John Hay Elementary Community Academy, a Chicago public school in Austin, a neighborhood not known for having exotic supermarket produce sections. “It’s shaped like a star.”
Laughing’s OK with Wayne Williams, the principal at John Hay.
It’s one of 14 Chicago schools where a federal grant is bringing produce to the kids. But at John Hay, the principal and third-grade teacher Jorie Schneider amped things up a bit. They’re mixing the mysterious with the mundane.
To read the rest of this story, which appeared in today’s Sun-Times, click here.