Science education projects
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Image courtesy of Lilly_M; image source: Wikimedia Commons
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Image courtesy of madlyinlovewithlife; image source: Flickr
General science
Chemistry Domestic science History Bread-making: Ages 10-15*
This article proposes inter- Primary esting and novel activities teaching science for primary school, combin- ing chemistry, history and cooking – teaching about in primary school microbes within the frame- work of bread-making. Al- Something as everyday as bread can though the author recom- mends the activity for 9- to offer a surprising spectrum of 11-year-olds, I am sure that younger secondary-school interdisciplinary teaching opportunities. students would also love to play the game, experiment with yeast and go one step By David Lewis further to prepare their own bread. Christiana Nicolaou, Cyprus illennia ago, humans the dough hours later, found it was mixed flour and water strangely lighter and fluffier. Thus the *Note that the author suggested together to make bread. foundations of leavened bread – bread carrying out the project with At some point, a bread-maker was raised using yeast, a widespread,
REVIEW M students aged 9-11 distracted, possibly by a passing naturally occurring microbe – were sabre-toothed tiger, and returning to laidw1. www.scienceinschool.org Science in School I Issue 23 : Summer 2012 I 33
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A mouldy developing fruiting bodies that we those in the bread. orange call mould. Ask the children some more ques- Safety note: Make sure none of the tions: children has allergies to mould, and · What happens to the bubbles on the remind them not to eat the food or fermenting yeast? (They eventually to get too close to the moulds in case pop.) they breathe in the spores. · Why doesn’t that happen to the We can watch a faster example of bubbles in the bread? (Because microbes feeding, using baker’s yeast they’re ‘inside’ the bread.) – a cluster of yeast microbes that can What is it about the bread that be seen, smelled and felt. Ask the class · keeps the bubbles in? (Flour mixed to mix a teaspoon of fresh or dried with water.) baker’s yeast with about 100 ml warm Now for a little activity. Ask the water and sugar and leave it some- children to imagine they are the yeast, where warm but ventilated. After a blowing carbon dioxide into the air. short time, the children should be Where does it go? Next, give them able to observe froth forming on the mixture and to detect a pungent smell. balloons and ask them to blow into These effects are caused by the pro- them. What is the difference in terms In this series of activities for chil- duction of carbon dioxide and alcohol of where the air goes? (It’s held within dren aged 9-11, we look at the science in a process known as fermentation. the balloons.) Help the children to of bread making and at the helpful Many children will know that yeast understand the difference by putting microbes involved. Activities 1-4 can is used to make bread, but how is all the inflated balloons in a box to be squeezed into an hour but bread- fermentation involved? simulate the carbon dioxide in a loaf making needs at least half a day, built Cut open a loaf of bread or a roll of bread, held in place by tiny ‘bal- around activities whilst the bread is and ask the children to describe what loons’ of dough. proving. they see. Hopefully they’ll say that Activity 2: the story of they see bubbles and that the bread Activity 1: looking at natural looks like a sponge. Ask them if they bread-making microbes can make a link between the bubbles In activity 1, the children will have There are many microbes in the they saw on the fermenting yeast and learned that yeast, sugar and water world around us, invisible to the naked eye. Like us, they are pro- Image courtesy of seniwati; image source: Flickr Mouldy grammed to survive and reproduce; to strawberries do so they feed off natural sugars and proteins wherever they find them and, in the process, cause them to decay. Have you ever reached for an orange and found a ring of white mould with blue-green mould in the centre, or taken cheese out of the fridge to find that a greenish-black mould got there first? It’s easy to go ‘fishing for microbes’ almost anywhere and you can take your class on a ‘fishing trip’ by getting them to leave plates of bread, cheese or fruit exposed to the air, in a safe place, and waiting for a few days or weeks. What the students will see is the result of the microbes in the air settling on the food and feeding off sugars and proteins in it, eventually
34 I Science in School I Issue 23 : Summer 2012 www.scienceinschool.org Science education projects
Image courtesy of duncan1890 / iStockphoto Vikings produce the trapped gas that makes sailing their the bread rise. They’ll also have longships learned that flour, when mixed with yeast and water, forms a ‘balloon’ to hold the gas bubbles in a loaf. As an introduction to the wider aspects of bread-making, you can read the story of The Little Red Hen. If you don’t have a copy, use the online Project Gutenberg versionw2. The story illus- trates clearly the main aspects of the bread-making process from field to plate. After reading the story, ask the class to illustrate and label each stage of the process and display it around the classroom. Can the students use the ideas from the book together with what they learned in activity 1 to write instructions for bread-making? There may be gaps but they can fill them in later after completing the rest of the activities. Activity 3: invaders and settlers General science Like many other regions, the British Isles have a history of invasion and of settlement: the Romans, Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Vikings all came to the British Isles as invaders and eventually settled. Similarly, mainland Europe has seen waves of invaders
and settlers over the centuries. The Primary newcomers brought some food with them but would soon have needed to eat local food. You can integrate the The Gokstad subjects of bread-making and bread Viking longship consumption into history lessons us- was excavated from ing the topic of invaders and settlers. a Norwegian burial We’ll begin with a role-play. the children to enter the area at dif- mound in In an area in the school hall or ferent seasons of the year as invaders 1880 Image courtesy of Karamell; image source: Wikimedia Commons playground, label cones or chairs with who won’t be there for long. Which signs listing individual food types foods can they eat and which will be such as berries, fruit, wheat, meat, unavailable to them? Can they sug- dairy products and vegetables. Ask gest why? What would the invaders the children to sit down in the area as do if they decided to settle there? if they were settlers, look at the named The activity should teach the foodstuffs around them, and decide children that some foodstuffs such which they would be likely to eat as as bread or vegetables have to be settlers. You may need to remind them cultivated and processed using tools, of the times of year that the different so are appropriate foods for a settler, food types are available and also the whereas others such as meat or ber- time taken to grow them or process ries can be taken straight away and them into edible food. processed easily, and are thus suitable Now repeat the role-play by asking foods for an invader. www.scienceinschool.org Science in School I Issue 23 : Summer 2012 I 35 of Anonymous frie urtesy nd o co f Elin age orD Im ; i ma ge so ur ce : W ik Activity 4: different types of Kneading im e d ia bread the dough C o m m For this activity, ask the children o n to bring in different types of bread. s Amongst others, you may get whole- meal, granary (with added bran and wheatgerm), oatmeal, rye, soda and flat breads. Set up an observation and taste test. Ask the children to suggest features for comparison such as what the bread looks like, its texture, the Image courtesy of Dawn Endico; image source: Flickr size of its holes / bubbles, its taste and French bread dough after prov- whether they like or dislike it. ing. The air bubbles are Safety note: before starting, make formed from the carbon sure none of the children suffers dioxide produced by from coeliac disease, an autoimmune the yeast during disease triggered by the wheat protein fermentation gluten.
Image courtesy of foonus; image source: Flickr
type of bread that makes it healthy vigorously – you can download the or unhealthy. Which has the highest recipe from the Science in School web- amount of fibre, for example, or the sitew5. You’ll need to add more warm lowest salt level? water until the dough becomes one ball that leaves the sides of the bowl Activity 5: making your own cleanly, at which point the children
bread should begin kneading it on a clean, Loaf of bread with Now for making the bread! Chil- floured desktop. What do they notice large air dren love this and it’s easy and almost happening to the dough as they knead bubbles always successful. Take it right back it? The gluten in the flour is being re- to the basics and get some whole leased and making the dough stretchy. If the bread is pre-packed, you can wheat grains for them to ‘mill’ using Once the dough is smooth, you’ll need check the bag for information on its a mortar and pestle. The children will to leave it in a warm place to prove ingredients and how it was baked. see the flour appear from the crushed (‘ripen’). Otherwise, you can find nutritional grains and can sieve it to get pure An hour later, ask the children what information about different types flour. I wouldn’t recommend making they observe and what they think has of bread on the Internetw3. If you’ve all your flour this way as it will take happened to the dough to make it already covered the topic of healthy forever. Instead, mix your product rise. Carefully cut a piece off using a eating, the children will understand with commercial bread flour to make sharp knife and show the children the the basics of the nutritional informa- up the required quantity. As a simul- bubbles in the dough. Remind them tion chart on the bag. If the children taneous activity, you could sow some of the balloon experiment to reinforce haven’t covered the topic yet, a quick wheat seeds and watch them grow – why the air stays in the dough. The online investigation of the categories perhaps producing the wheat for next bread dough requires a second knead- in a nutritional information chart will year’s class! This links neatly to the ing before it is left to prove again; this soon tell them what is healthy and story of The Little Red Hen. helps to spread the yeast and the air what is notw4. You could then discuss Remember those helpful microbes throughout the dough. Finally it’ll be healthiness by looking at the nutri- in the first activity? Begin with some ready for baking. Make a loaf of your tional information on each bag and of the yeast mixture that the children own and you can use it as an example, ranking the breads in order of healthi- made in activity 1. As soon as it froths, cutting it open once baked to smell ness, deciding what it is about each mix it with the flour and salt and stir the yeast and see the bubbles.
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Acknowledgement This activity was first published on Freedom to Teach, the Collins Educa- tion blogw6.
Web references w1 – For more information about the history of bread, see: www. breadinfo.com/history.shtml w2 – The complete illustrated story of The Little Red Hen is freely available online on the Gutenberg Project website (www.gutenberg.org) or via the direct link: http://tinyurl. com/727ukyv w3 – For basic nutritional informa- tion about different types of bread, see: www.dailymail.co.uk/health/ To read the original version of the bread-making activity, search the article-104785/How-good-loaf.html With a teaching degree specialis- blog or use the direct link: http:// or use the shorter link: ing in science, David Lewis has tinyurl.com/7qf2zp5 http://tinyurl.com/c2vpmzc been a primary-school teacher for 20 w4 – To learn about food labels, see: Resources years in the UK and now teaches at
The Teens Health website (www. an international school in Cyprus. General science Norwegian chemist Erik Fooladi kidshealth.org/teen; search for In 2006, David and his pupils made offers a set of experiments compar- ‘food labels’) or use the direct link: it to the finals of the Rolls Royce ing the chemistry of baking soda, http://tinyurl.com/cpn4xbf Science Prize, awarded for innova- horn salts and baking powder in tive approaches to science in the w5 – A simple recipe for baking Christmas cakes on his website of curriculum. He has been involved in bread can be downloaded from gastronomic science activities (in teacher training and curriculum de- the Science in School website: www. Norwegian). See www.naturfag. scienceinschool.org/2012/issue23/ velopment, and in his spare time, he
no or follow the direct link: http:// Primary writes for Teach Primary magazine, bread#resources tinyurl.com/3spkkwm Collins Education and an education w6 – Collins Education publishes If you found this article inspiring, blog in Cyprus. teaching and learning resources for you might enjoy the other primary- children of all ages. Supported by school articles in Science in School. Collins Education, the Freedom to See www.scienceinschool.org/ To learn how to use this Teach blog offers articles and infor- primary code, see page 65. mation for teachers by teachers. See: http://freedomtoteach.blogspot. Image courtesy of Claudio.Ar; image source: Flickr Image courtesy of Claudio.Ar; image source: com
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