Learning in our environment – at Anaa’s Baking Studio

 

On Friday 10th January, our excited learners set out once again to extend their learning, linked to the unit of inquiry outside our usual school environment. The students were all ready to have some baking fun, at Anaa’s Baking Studio in Aundh. Our learners observed the live demo of making cupcakes, this helped them visual a procedure and link it back to our procedural writing in class. They explored the different ingredients with their senses and sorted the processed and unprocessed ingredients used in the recipe.

The importance of measuring ingredients, for making cupcakes, was discussed and we observed the different tools such as measuring cups and spoons and how they are ideal for measuring the ingredients for baking.  Enthusiastically, we observed the steps involved and witnessed the actual baking in the oven. One highlight of the experience was decorating their cupcakes using frosting, chocolate icing, and sprinkles and finally, we relished eating every bite of our scrumptious cupcake.

This experiential learning trip helped our students to practice some basic Mathematics skills in a real-world situation. The following recipes and baking steps helped build their language skills and reinforce our current writing genre. Along with learning about basic cooking skills, we saw the importance of kitchen safety, both food safety and staying safe in a kitchen. 

As a way to consolidate the experiences and learning from our baking session, our learners reflected and shared some of their thoughts and ideas:

“It is important to measure the things before we mix them.” – Siyun

“If we add milk to the cake batter, it becomes flowing consistency.” – Yuma

“The cupcake rises and becomes fluffy because we add baking powder.” – Yena

“I learned the process of baking cupcakes and enjoyed decorating it using icing                                                                       and sprinkles.” – Ishaan

As you can see, we engaged in a truly transdisciplinary learning experience that shows how the “real world” is not broken into subject areas- there was math, science, language and art all rolled into one!

A big thank you to Ms. Anaa and Mr. Abhijeet for providing such a wonderful baking experience and sharing their time and expertise with P1 learners and teachers. 

Why not work with your child at home to bake or cook something that the family loves to share and use this as a time to further develop skills and language in a real-world context – it could be a good way to reinforce their learning in your mother tongue.

Team P1