The History of Bread, Volcanos, and Building Tall...

The children spent the first two weeks of January using a hand mill to grind wheat berries into flour. A wonderful practical life activity that let's the children experience and understand where their food comes from.

Some overheard quotes:
"This is hard work"
"Someone should invent a machine to make this easier"
"Now I know what the Red Hen felt when no one wanted to help her bake her bread."

This week we began our study of the history of bread. First stop: flat breads and crackers.

We spent all week experimenting with wheat cracker recipes.

We started with a simple recipe of wheat flour, oil, water, and salt.
"A little dry" , the class unanimously agreed.

Then we changed the recipe by substituting orange juice and orange zest for the water.
"Better but needs to be sweeter." Lots of ideas were shared on how to improve the recipe.

We added a little maple syrup to the next batch.
"Yummy, we can taste the citrus and maple. It's good."

And for our last batch of the week we used butter instead of oil.
"The best batch ever. Let's make more."
"Hey, if we keep make our own flour and crackers, we won't need Wegman's anymore!"

Here's our set up...
Each child can mix their own batch of dough...

Rolling our the dough...

Cutting the cracker shapes....

Bake for a few minutes in the toaster oven, then eat.

Some other friends were conducting a different kind of experiment....volcanoes.

It's really great when you discover a new way to use a familiar work...