September is National Hunger Month, so I wanted to share some simple ways to get involved.

1. This one is easy: Join Team No Kid Hungry at nokidhungry.org.

2. Spread Awareness. One in 5 (that’s 16 million) children in the U.S. struggle with hunger. Help raise awareness. Share information about hunger on your Facebook or via Twitter. Let people know where they can bring food donations in your local area. In Santa Clarita, it’s Help the Children and the Santa Clarita Valley Food Pantry.

3. Play Games. With the learning games on FreeRice.com, rice is donated for every correct answer. You could also have a Grocery Store Scavenger Hunt. Make a list of needed items and have your kids hunt for those item at the store. Here’s what’s currently on the list of most needed items at the Santa Clarita Valley Food Pantry: canned meats (tuna), mac ‘n’ cheese, cereal, oatmeal, pasta, canned soups, peanut butter, dried soups (ramen), rice, beans, canned fruit, canned vegetables, bar soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes (children’s sizes), diapers (especially larger sizes), shampoo.

4. Set up a lemonade stand or host a bake sale with friends to raise funds for No Kid Hungry, Feeding America or your local food bank.

5. Organize a canned food drive. See if your child would like to try to organize a food drive at school or reach out to your local church, mom’s group, book club, etc. DoSomething.org has great tips and ideas for organizing a food drive. Remember, every can counts.

6. Volunteer at the Local Food Pantry. The SCV Food Pantry can use volunteers to pick up food donation items from local businesses and to help at the pantry itself. You can find details on their website. Help the Children also has volunteer opportunities including food distribution, warehouse workers, office volunteers and drivers.

7. Eat Out. Share Our Strength and No Kid Hungry have a special September campaign called Dine Out for No Kid Hungry, where proceeds at select restaurants go to the fight against hunger. SCV restaurants include: Togo’s Kabuki Japanese Restaurant, Corner Bakery, Baja Fresh in Canyon Country and Valencia, and Chronic Tacos in Saugus.

8. Cook with your kids. Then, select all of the food items for that favorite dish and donate those items to the food pantry so another family can experience your favorite meal. (Help the Children accepts fresh produce donations as well as canned and dried goods.)

9. Empower your child. Talk to your child about hunger (at a level appropriate for their age) and see what ideas they come up with to help fight hunger. One young boy started making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to give to those in need. Another child organized a neighborhood bike ride to raise money. Another child started a program to share extra veggies from her family’s garden with families in need and her actions inspired others to do the same. Do you have extra garden produce you could share?

If you’re nervous about how to talk to your children about this, consider reading a book with them to introduce the topic. Here are a few suggestions, shared by my blogging friend Zina at Let’s Lasso the Moon and Mia of Pragmatic Mom: “Stone Soup” by Jon J. Muth; “Faith the Cow” by Susan Bame Hoover; “Uncle Willie and the Soup Kitchen” by Dyanne Disolvo-Ryan; “Sam and the Lucky Money” by Karen Chin, Cornelius Van Wright and Ying-Hwa Hu; “The Good Garden: How One Family Went From Hunger to Having Enough” by Katie Smith Milway

10. Make a donation. Help the Children estimates that if everyone in the Santa Clarita Valley gave just 50 cents, they could provide shopping visits for 5,000 families. Here are some other organizations to consider supporting: No Kid Hungry, Feeding America, The Dinner Garden and Oxfam.

Hunger is not just an issue in the U.S., and most of these ideas will work anywhere. Support your local food bank or the agencies in your country that help fight hunger.

Share what you do. I’d love to know what you’re doing to fight hunger in the Santa Clarita Valley and elsewhere.

Jennifer Fischer is co-founder of the SCV Film Festival, a mom of two, an independent filmmaker and owner of Think Ten Media Group, whose Generation Arts division offers programs for SCV youth. She writes about her parenting journey on her blog, The Good Long Road. Her commentary is published Saturdays on SCVNews.com.