BCTF/CIDA Global Classroom Initiative 2005
A TOAST TO OUR COMMUNITY
by Catherine Brett Whitelaw
Subject: Social responsibility and social studies Grades: 5–7 (can be adapted for younger grades) Lesson title: A toast to our community
Brief overview:
This lesson is a useful tool for building community and engaging students in a dialogue on social responsibility at the beginning of a school year. Students bake bread with a dual purpose:
1. to explore, through the metaphor of baking bread, the potential dynamics and purposes of a classroom, and
2. to begin investigating the idea that everyday things are connected to the local/global environment and that each of us has the power to effect change in the world around us.
CIDA development theme:
• Environmental sustainability
Learning outcomes from B.C. Ministry of Education IRP:
Social responsibility
Contributing to the classroom and school community
• sharing responsibility for their social and physical environment
• participating and contributing to the class and to small groups Valuing diversity and defending human rights
• treating others fairly and respectfully; showing a sense of ethics Exercising democratic rights and responsibilities
• knowing and acting on rights and responsibilities (local, national, global)
• articulating and working toward a preferred future for the community, nation, and planet—a sense of idealism
Social studies Grades 2 and 3 Society and culture
• describe ways members of a community meet one another’s needs Grade 5
Economy and technology
• analyze the relationship between development of communities and their available natural resources
Environment
• demonstrate understanding of sustainability, stewardship, and renewable versus non- renewable natural resources
• assess effects of lifestyles and industries on local and global environments Grade 6
Society and culture
• assess the relationship between cultures and their environments Grade 7
Society and culture
• compare how various cultures meet common needs Environment
• evaluate how ancient cultures were influenced by their environment
Time required:
Three 40-minute class periods. The first period stands alone. The second two can be combined.
Bread baking (lesson two) requires extra time for the dough to rise. Students can work on lesson three during that time. Another option is to keep the three lessons separate and use the wait time in lesson two for other related activities: clean up, drawing, reading about bread in different cultures.
Required equipment and materials:
Equipment—for each group for four to five students
• one large mixing bowl
• two large, clean tea towels
• a wooden spoon
• measuring cups and measuring spoons
• two bread pans (they can usually be found at thrift stores, if needed)
• cooling racks, if possible Ingredients
3 cups warm water
1 tbsp honey or brown sugar
1 tbsp active dry yeast (don’t use the instant kind unless you use a recipe with eggs) 1 tsp salt
6 cups flour
Procedure:
Lesson one—the history and origins of bread
1. Brainstorm types of bread (how many different cultural types of bread can students name?
e.g., pita—Greek; naan and chapaati—South Asian; challah—Jewish; baguette—French) 2. Ask students where they get their bread. How often do they eat bread (at every meal)? What
food group is bread from? Where or how would they have gotten their bread 100 years ago?
What if they lived on a farm?
3. Put up Jonathan Swift’s: “Bread is the staff of life,” and discuss. (Define what “staff” means in this context.) Most cultures have a bread or equivalent. Why are they different? Why doesn’t everyone have the same size or shape of bread? (Resources and technologies and symbolism are different.)
4. What are the ingredients in bread? (flour, yeast, sugar, water) Ask students to research, in small groups, where the ingredients come from and then draw a map of how these things get to their homes. They should include as many steps (cultivation, processing, transportation) and environmental impacts as they can.
Lesson two—bake bread
1. Before the lesson, assemble ingredients and equipment (see recipe below). This activity is best done in a staffroom or school kitchen. Remind students to wash hands thoroughly before and after handling ingredients and equipment. If concerned about health of any students, have all students wear plastic gloves.
2. Divide students into small, diverse groups of four or five students. Each group will prepare dough for baking (each group’s dough should produce two loaves). It helps to post the recipe and steps for all to see.
3. At the end of each step, discuss the metaphors of baking bread (see below).
Note: The cookbook Laurel’s Kitchen has some very useful information about ingredients and some excellent tips for baking bread.
Recipe
(You may want to use your own recipe—this is a basic recipe adapted from Laurel’s Kitchen.
Some recipes include eggs, butter, and/or no sugar.) Ingredients
3 cups warm water
1 tbsp honey or brown sugar (sugar makes the crust browner; honey keeps bread fresher) 1 tbsp active dry yeast (don’t use the instant kind unless you want to use a recipe with eggs) 1 tsp salt
6 cups flour
a. Combine the warm water, yeast, and sugar in a large mixing bowl. Leave the mixture until the yeast bubbles up and looks like seafoam.
b. When the yeast has bubbled up, start adding flour, a cup at a time. Keep adding the flour cup by cup (and the teaspoon of salt) (you may require more than the six cups of flour).
When the dough gets tougher to stir, start kneading with hands, folding the dough over and gently pushing with knuckles.
c. When the dough reaches consistency (i.e., no sticky bits), set the bowl aside, cover it with a tea towel (keeping it warm—but not hot!), and allow the dough to rise (approximately 30–45 minutes).
d. Grease pans for the next step.
e. When the dough is approximately double it’s original size, knead it down again, and then divide it up for your greased pans.
f. Place the divided dough into the two pans making sure no air is trapped in or beneath the dough.
g. Cover the pans and allow the dough to rise again to double its size—to the top edge of the pan.
h. Pre-heat your oven to 375°C, toward the end of this rising period.
i. Bake the bread at 375°C for about 40 minutes, or until the top is golden brown and the bottom of the pan sounds hollow if you tap it.
j. Allow loaves to cool before slicing.
Enjoy!
• Some bread metaphors or “How is baking bread like a Grade 6 class?”
• Talk about metaphors—what they are, what their purpose is. Allow students to generate metaphors they see in this activity. Below are some examples.
Step one—Ingredients and students:
(Add first ingredients—sugar/honey, warm water, yeast.)
• Each ingredient/student is very different (e.g., ingredients: flour, water and yeast are different in texture, smell, function. Students are different in their likes and dislikes, appearance, family, size, and shapes).
• Ingredients are not very useful completely on their own (except maybe water). Students also need others to survive/live.
• When they work together, ingredients make bread to feed and sustain people. When students work together, their co-operation also has many benefits.
Step two
(Give the yeast time to bubble up.)
• Like the yeast, students need time to be active and time to be quiet.
Step three
(Start adding flour. Stir in approximately two cups at a time.)
• We add the flour slowly and gently. This can be likened to how we treat one another.
Step four
• Allow the dough to rise. We need time in our learning to think and reflect; to allow ideas to grow and develop in order for our selves to grow.
Step five
• Learning is also a continuous process. Sometimes we feel flattened by it. But then we grow again and have confidence.
Step six
• Divide dough into two pans. At the end of the year, we also go our separate ways—but we have a part of one another and a history of shared experiences to take with us.
Ask students to write a reflection on these metaphors and their feelings about baking bread together (how might this impact upon their year?) either at the end of each step or at the end of the entire activity.
Activities to do while waiting for bread to rise
• engage in an art project related to bread
• read Bread, Bread, Bread, by Ann Morris
• research different breads from around the world
• make butter for the bread.
Lesson three—impact of bread making
1. Discuss the maps students made in lesson one
• Where do bread ingredients come from?
• What steps are involved in growing the grain, getting the grain to the kitchen, and then the bread to their home?
• What is the environmental impact of each of these steps?
• What could we do to lessen their impact on the environment?
- Could we get all of these ingredients from our community? our province?
- Are these solutions true only for bread?
• Some examples of ways to lessen our impact on the natural environment:
- Buy or make things using local ingredients - Use less
- Make things at home
- Walk instead of drive to the store
2. Have students create posters based on their learning.
Assessment suggestions:
1. Utilize the B.C. Performance Standards for Social Responsibility http://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/perf_stands/social_resp.htm as appropriate.
2. Lesson one—assessment questions:
a. How did the students work as a group? Were they considerate of one another? Did everyone participate?
b. Research—were they able to use prior knowledge to gather relevant information for the assignment?
c. Map making—were they able to produce a detailed, mostly accurate map? Is there evidence of good critical thinking?
3. Lesson two—assessment questions:
a. How did the students work as a group? Were they considerate of one another? Did everyone participate?
b. Were students able to articulate relevant metaphors (in discussion and written work)?
4. Lesson three—assessment questions:
a. Posters—are messages reflective of good critical thinking and an understanding of individual responsibility toward the environment and society?
Lesson resources:
Books
Morris, A. (1989). Bread, Bread, Bread. USA: Harper Collins
Laurel Robertson, Carol Flinders, and Bronwen Godfrey (1976). Laurel’s Kitchen A Handbook for Vegetarian Cookery and Nutrition. Berkeley, CA: Nilgiri Press.
Music
Gates, D. (2002). Sail Around the World. On David Gates Songbook [CD]. Location: WEA International
Websites
• Bread baking info—http://www.tramline.com/tours/sci/bake-s/_tourlaunch1.htm
• The history of bread—http://www.bakersfederation.org.uk/History_of_Bread.aspx
• Bread in different cultures—http://agexted.cas.psu.edu/docs/29503579.html
• Bread ingredients—www.baking911.com/bread/101_ingredients.htm#Ingredients
• Where wheat grows—
http://atlas.gc.ca/site/english/maps/economic/agriculture/agriculture1996/wheatacreagebycd1996
• Where dairy farms are located—
http://atlas.gc.ca/site/english/maps/economic/agriculture/agriculture1996/dairycattlebycd1996
• Museum of bread culture—www.brotmuseum-ulm.de/museumen/
• History of bread—www.botham.co.uk/bread/index.htm
• Yeast—www.botham.co.uk/bread/yeast.htm
• Wheat—www.botham.co.uk/bread/grain.htm
• General
- www.exploratorium.edu/cooking/bread/index.html - www.exploratorium.edu/cooking/bread/overview.html
• Photos—www.tropix.co.uk/Themes/bread/bread.htm
• Food security—www.agr.gc.ca/misb/fsb/fsb-bsa_e.php?page=index
Suggestions to extend the lesson:
• For Grade 7, look at the origins of bread (e.g., among the Egyptians) or bread (food) as a human right (e.g., in Ancient Rome every man [what about the women and children?] was given free bread).
• Find quotes about bread and discuss the historical and cultural significance of bread.
• Read Bread, Bread, Bread, by Ann Morris.
• Play Sail Around the World, by Bread.
