Cookery at your child's school

[KurriKawari]

Just wanted to know if this is normal for schools. DD11 is given a list of what to buy for cookery lesson. Sometimes the things are a pain fo her to transport (for example 100ml milk and 1 egg). Carrying all that is a pain in itself but on the same day she has to take in her PE kit and books. I've got a small screw top box for the milk, will cushion the egg with lots of tissue, decant everything else like the flour, sugar, raisins into smaller sandwich bags and label. There are no lockers in the school.
They've asked for a few tablespoons of cocoa powder! even the smallest bag of flour, caster sugar, cocoa powder etc is too much for what she needs and so we end with ingredients we won' ever use or then make a conscious effort to use up, because I hate food waste.
Is it too much for the school to ask parents for payment at the beginning of the year and the school provide at least some of the ingredients? Esp for PITA things like milk and eggs? And cupcake cases?!

Our school used to ask us for a donation to cover all the ingredients for the recipes. The recipe sheet for the term and the ingredients were clearly labelled so we could decide if we wanted the hassle of providing our own or letting them buy in bulk (it was cheaper).

I think the donation was only about £12 for the 10 weeks of lessons.

It's a much better idea. Maybe in the past some parents felt that the donation was voluntary and then send child in with no ingredients. I could see then why the teacher would prefer each child to provide their own.

When I was at school my mother used to pack the egg in a small food bag and put it in the box with the flour to cushion it. It didn't ever break.

Part of what is being taught is surely about 'prep' as much as putting the ingredients together though.
When my dc occasionally needed something you had to buy in a much bigger quantity than they needed, which were store cupboard ingredients, then I'd just get them to arragne with their mates that one of us provided it one time and another did on another occasion. It's not that big a deal.

I don't have DC but I remember home economics from my school days (just over a decade ago) and it was a bloody faff. Always having to force my mum to buy crap we didn't need. Add onto that I'm lactose intolerant but they didn't allow me to bring my lacto free cheese or soya milk etc so I had to go buy stuff I couldn't even eat🙄

It's a bit of effort for your child to join in some really good fun lessons, learning loads of life skills and a wider range of skills-
Numeracy, literacy, science knowledge, geography, environmental issues, sharing, responsibility, time keeping- loads!!!

Same at DD's school, she had to carry the stuff round all day too. They rarely made anything decent either and don't seem to teach them the basics and they were so rushed 45min lessons, that things often weren't cooked properly. Kids who didn't fetch in ingredients got no mark
Needless to say she didn't choose it as an option.

Sorry, don't know what happened to my punctuation 😆

DT teacher here who does teach food on and off.
I'm feeling the need to defend the subject.
Any questions please ask.

Ours is good, you pay at the start for the year, then you only have to bring in the odd thing like pizza toppings, everything else they provide.

I find the Sistema pots are good for random liquid quantities. At her school they can take the ingredients to the food tech room first thing and refrigerate anything necessary. DD is doing it for GCSE and in 3 years so far we've only had 1 inedible dish (pasta).

I would not have fresh milk, sugar, flour, eggs or cheese in the house.

What on earth do you eat?!

Formatting fail!

Graffitiartist is spot on. Most schools only have a part time technician so there is no way schools can shop or order, weigh and provide all ingredients. As for weighing out in lessons having 24 working sets of scales x 2 food rooms with lessons happening at the same time isn't going to happen. Budget won't cover the cost of batteries let alone the scales.
1 hour lessons are 50 mins as they don't arrive bang on time and they have to get to their next lesson on on time.
The key is for schools to select manageable family recipes and provide items such as herbs and spices, oil and seasonings for a small cost whilst parents provide the main ingredients. So for a chicken curry the school can put together the spice mix and charge 15p saving parents the cost of buying 3 different jars of spices. Online delivery order by a school once a fortnight for the basics works well.
It's about the parents and school working together. Also not all Food lessons are taught by specialists so some schools follow pre bought schemes of work that don't take it account the actual realities of busy parents on budgets and also short lesson times.
Food Preparation/Technology lessons can be rewarding and enjoyable with correct planning and also this could avoid negative parental perceptions of the subject.

Re eggs. When I was at school I used to pre crack the eggs into a airtight small box so they couldn't smash in my bag!

Thank you Teletone

Parents just don't pay the contributions - when anything up to half of the students are dependent upon free school meals and UC is meaning the parents have no idea if they're going to be able to afford the rent next month, they aren't going to be stumping up cash they don't have in September on top of uniform, shoes, PE kit, pens, pencils, notebooks, revision guides for every subject, homework diaries and everything else - usually at the point in the year when benefits fuck up, free school meal entitlements are wiped from SIMS and not reinstated until the end of October (local authority at fault there, it happens every year), Oyster cards stop working or they need to get one for the first time, meaning they need to pay for travel, and it's often a five week month before payday, another 15-20 quid is another 15-20 quid too much.

Ours was like this, they provided salt, pepper, oil and dried herbs but we had to provide everything else preweighed and measured. It was a bit of a PITA but we only generally needed to buy the meat/fish etc, everything else was store cupboard ingredients. They always stressed that we shouldn't buy anything apart from the main ingredient specially and should substitute/improvise to suit. DD said there was no time in the lesson for weighing and measuring so the school buying in bulk wouldn't work.

My DS has cookery and PE on the same day for the second year running. He was particularly annoyed this week when he carted in a load of ingredients, including a tin of tomatoes, and then the teacher wasn't in and the supply teacher not only refused to let the kids leave their ingredients in the cookery room in the morning but then refused to actually let them cook when they turned up for the class, last lesson, having all carried their stuff round all day.

yes ds,s is school is the same he always seems to make the same things ,too we have had several lots of cupcakes ,he's made sausage roll,s twice ,cookies etc, when I was at school the girls always carried their ingredients in wicker baskets( 1980,s) I don't know if this was just a " thing" at my school.

My children's school have a £5 charge to cover basic ingredients.

Although i really dislike it when they do any cooking in school. The food is rarely edible, mostly because it's been sat out all day or thrown about in a school bag. My son used to just throw it out on the way home.

And most of the time they are learning how to cook things they can already do already.

I remember in school making a traffic light sandwhich. I have never had to call upon those skills ever again. Or make a sandwhich with little holes in it

@grafittiartist. I teach Dt too so have to deliver KS3 Food lessons. I quite enjoy it. We have a rule that all ingredients have to be in the fridge before registration, if they are high risk foods and this has not happened the students are simply not allowed to cook with those ingredients. We also have a rule that any food cannot be collected until the end of the day. We always have spare for any student who has alerted to us that they are having difficulties and for pp students.

My son does cooking lessons and I can confirm the ingredients are lol in the fridge first thing. They are allowed out early to collect the food so they can make the bus home. Somethings have been really good. So new foods have been tried and liked! Some not so much. It they are learning skills. Weighing ingredients, cooking and washing up. I don’t see a downside really.

Hi Elephant!
Similar set up with us. Works well.
I LOVE teaching it- so much fun! Exhausting- but the kids love it

@Spacerader what is a traffic light sandwich??

Tomato, cheese and lettuce?

What on earth ingredients would a school cookery class ask for that you wouldn't use at home?

Worcestershire Sauce (2 vinegar haters here), a few spices - very plain eaters here! DD had quite a few recipes this year that required meat so I think the cost does add up.

graffiti my only question is who generally plans the recipes as the ones my DD did this year they hardly had enough time and although my DD liked the lessons the teacher got very shouty towards the end when they (the whole class!) were running out of time! Not fair on the teacher either IMO. Some were in a double lesson and some in a single (very ambitious!).