Potatoes grow on trees, and cotton is sheared from a sheep.

Those are a couple of the things that children these days believe, said Lynne Middleton, a University of Tennessee extension agent and 4-H Club coordinator.

So Friday, a day before the Hamilton County Fair opens at Chester Frost Park, she and more than a dozen others tried to give kids a chance to see the truth. Students from two Hamilton County schools were brought to the fair site to learn more about how agriculture makes modern living possible.

“We’re trying to show them how food gets from the farm to the kitchen table,” said Ms. Middleton. This is her second year organizing what they call the “Agraventure.”

Two school groups, one from Hixson Elementary and another from Woodmore Elementary, toured the fairgrounds Friday. Ms. Middleton said the Extension Service invited Title I schools, a classification given to schools with a high percentage of students from low-income homes.

At the start of the daylong fair tour, youngsters sat on hay bales, wriggling as sprigs of hay stuck through their pants and poked them. But visiting the big livestock later had the youngsters big-eyed with amazement.

“Before I wanted to be a soccer player, but now I think I’d like to be a farmer,” said Drew Bolano, 9, of Hixson. “It’s really cool.”

The goal of the event isn’t specifically to inspire a new generation of farmers, Ms. Middleton said. But over at the sheep livestock exhibit, 57-year-old Jesse Hewlett hopes when he shears sheep and talks about how wool is made, kids take a second look at agriculture.

“Someone has to replace us,” Mr. Hewlett said. “Today’s farmers aren’t coming from the rural areas. They are inner-city kids who are getting exposed to agriculture.”

He tried to explain to the kids that when his loud electric shears plow through a sheep’s coat, he isn’t hurting the animal. But when that same sheep broke free and Mr. Hewlett chased it, students were more impressed by how fast the sheep farmer ran.

“It scared me a little bit when she ran away,” said Asia Jones, 9, of Chattanooga, who said her favorite animals were the cows.

For most of the students, Friday’s up-close look at cows, chickens, horses, sheep and goats was their first exposure to livestock. The notion that someone could live their first 9 or 10 years without seeing the animals seems almost foreign to Catherine Hay, 16, and Emily Grosskreutz, 15, of Hixson, 4-H members who were showing horses to the kids and leading the students from place to place.

“They ask some of the funniest questions,” Catherine said. “They always ask about the tails and manes. It’s sort of funny to think they haven’t seen these animals before.”

For Dana Malone’s fourth-grade students from Hixson, seeing farm animals may or may not be something new.

“It’s sort of a mixed culture in Hixson,” Ms. Malone said. “It’s a good reference point for when we get back to the classroom. I can say, ‘Do you remember on the field trip when we saw this or that?’”

But for the students from Woodmore in the Brainerd area, seeing a cow or chicken very likely is a new experience, teacher Tammy Craven said.

“They are learning about their world,” Emily said. “They are learning that hamburger doesn’t just come from a Happy Meal all by itself.”

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