Transcript

We do a lot of cooking in my classroom.  I feel that cooking is a life skill that children need to learn in order to feel confident and competent in cooking for themselves.  I feel it's important just as writing and doing math is important in their lives.  I've got all sorts of equipment: frying pans, hot plates, blenders, we have plastic cups, and plates, and cutlery, measuring cups, and spoons for our math connections.  

All sorts of activities can be done when you're talking about cooking with children.  I have some cookbooks in my classroom.  And for one year for example, we had a theme in our class where we were talking about Italy, and she read in this book about the dessert tiramisu, and she came to me and said, Can we make this? And of course we did.  And then of course we wrote about it.  We write about our cooking activities in our journals.  Usually at the time, I will keep it as rough work in their journal but at the end of the year, we do pick out the recipes and the children will work in partners together copying and illustrating the recipe and the procedure to make a little book that families can enjoy.  

One of the literacy connections that I make with cooking is with the book called, Stone Soup.  Stone Soup is a wonderful folk tale about how people can work together to make something wonderful.  And when we make stone soup together we actually don't put stones in the pot, but we do each bring vegetables to chop and to put into the pot so that everything works together.  A child will bring a carrot, a piece of celery, or a tomato.  Sometimes children forget to bring their vegetables, and often I'll say, Well, what do you have in your lunch?  And one year a little boy had a Clementine orange, and I said, What do you think, should we put that in?  And he wasn't sure, so I asked the class, I said, Do you think? And a little boy said, Of course, its Stone Soup, it'll still be fine if we put everything together. And of course it absolutely was.  I always said it gave a little sweetness to the soup.  And then of course, we wrote about how to make it.

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