Domestic science atrocity.

[WingBingo]

DS12 cooked food for the first time at school today

This is what the teacher thought was a good idea for them to cook. It really is the end of a loaf, covered in tomato sauce and sprinkled with grated cheese.

I do wonder what was going through their mind when they decided this was a good idea.

Yum.

yes, we did the washing up thing I've just remembered- that's how I know how to do it properly!

It looks like he's never made cheese on toast before, so it seems like an ok place to start!

Tiffin

When my mum was in school (in rural Lapland), every week the girls as a group would cook a 3 course meal, including baking bread from scratch, lay the table nicely, and then the boys would troop in (from their woodwork lesson), sit down, and the girls would serve them the meal!

I remember DD taking a pizza base and a jar of pizza topping for a food tech lesson in year 8 or 9. I expressed an opinion ( negative) to the school as it seemed ridiculously dumbed down. At the same age I remember making dough for the base and making a tomato sauce.

I remember doing a pizza in food tech, we had to cook something for a special diet so I made a gluten free pizza (scone base) but I also made it a sweet one with jam and chocolate and a creme egg in the middle. It was delicious. Now you can buy sweet pizzas in the freezer section in shops - I was ahead of the curve!

A school can't assume that children are clueless to the point of not knowing how to read a recipe or make toast and at the same time expect them to understand geometry or literature. These cooking lessons assume they have been raised by wolves away from civilization (which may be the case, but in this case how can they be expected to learn the academic curriculum?)

1990s we did pineapple upside down cake and baked Alaska. 2 lessons in 14 years of school.
I am a good baker ao maybe it paid off!

There's a reason we rather meanly referred to DD's lessons as 'Food Rocket Science...

yes....I expressed reservations about DC doing food tech for GCSE as we are vegetarians but was told by the teacher- oh no! we LOVE catering to different diets...it will be FINE

until....the lesson where they were to make 'chicken curry'
DC had to

1. bring a pack of frozen quorn chunks
2. bring a jar of curry sauce
3. mix the two

such a debased approach to cooking

Laziness at it's finest! 😆 Talking about the school, not your son btw

I did ‘Food Studies’ for GCSE 30 years ago. The teacher and I had a mutual loathing, we were meant to have a different teacher but she left at the end of Year 9. We made…nothing, absolutely nothing. One parents evening my DM mentioned how disappointed I was to not be doing any actual cooking. Teachers reply? “You can do the whole two year course and not need to do any cooking at all!” It was all just writing about labelling and other riveting stuff. 🙄

But teacher don't start with non-euclidian geometry. The very first lesson a child will have is very early on and it's literally "this is a triangle. Shall we count the sides". You build up skills and knowledge. If you took a child who had had no teaching and expected them to learn the tough stuff straight away they would fail horribly. Like if you tried teaching advanced calculus before someone could count to 10.**
For food tech it's the same, except the children will likely be different stages. So starting with something simple allows the teacher to teach the basics AND assess who is at what level in the class.

Starting with the simple stuff and building up is literally how teaching works.

** Although one of the most famous books on maths takes 3 very long volumes to prove that 1+1=2. So maths is complicated.

Another example would be making an omelette. It's a very simple thing to cook. It's one of the first things I learned to cook as a child and likely they will at some point be asked to in school. It's also, famously, often asked of trainee chefs in Michelin starred French restaurants. Because it's simple but takes skill to achieve perfection.

i don’t think either of my boys have done cookery in primary school, whereas we frequently did in the junior years. By the time I reached grammar school I’d already covered a lot of basic cooking.

I do think we have to realise that they may have a 55 minute lesson to do the cookery in, including registering, setting out the lesson, prep, cooking and cleaning. So it can be difficult to determine what to cook. My son made pizza a month ago and they made the dough in one lesson; it was then frozen and defrosted for them to make into pizza later in the week.

He definitely has made cheese on toast before.

this is the sad part, he used all the ingredients he was allocated. Each student was allocated a sprinkle each.

DH is a chef and experiments at home. Maybe my judgement is clouded as we make lots of different recipes at home already.

Also, part of the class is cleaning up. On the one hand, that limits the cooking time. On the other hand it's actually an important part of the lesson. My son cooked a lot at home from a young age. But as a youngish child he would use EVERY pot in the house. Learning to clean up as you go, and wash up and wipe down at the end is a skill. Some kids won't know how to turn an oven on. Some will be confident cooks but not proficient tidy uppers. A few might be good at all those things.

They can do a lot of different things through one simple lesson. The problem with starting complicated is you actually have less opportunities to teach all the different parts if a good foundation.

I also think, if people's kids are genuinely already cooking elaborate three course meals at home/baking their own bread then what more do parents want them to learn from the lesson? There's not much more the school can teach them so they might as well focus on teaching skills to kids that might not have them. Which is the whole point of school.

Aged 11 in primary school we made cheese, potato and onion pie, apple crumble, scones, rock cakes - in groups of about 8 for one lesson a week for 6 weeks and then it was another groups turn. At that time my school had a domestic science room with proper ovens - all gone now. :(
We had two classrooms for "Home Ec" with the same sort of set up at secondary school - as far as I know those are still there and used for "Food Tech" Btech type classes.

My first lesson was a sandwich-I remember having to work out what ingredients to use and write about it (the making of the sandwich took a few minutes but you'd have thought it was mega complicated the way the teacher went on about it)

At some point we had to make a shepherds pie and my father hit the roof over the powdered mash we had to use (I'd never eaten smash before that)

I dropped the subject as soon as I could as I was a child carer and knew how to cook as I'd been doing it for years by that point

A sandwich was beyond some of the other pupils as they'd never touched an oven,let along cooked anything

Sad when you think about it-i taught my dc how to cook from a young age and I'm amazed at how many of my (much younger) colleagues at work cant cook beyond toast

At school, back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, we had four streams: 1 for the cleverest clogs (inc yours truly); 2 for reasonably clever people; L who weren’t clever at all but were made to study one language ; and H which stood for Home Economics. Despite or perhaps because of not cooking at school at all, I’m a very decent cook even if I say it myself.

Mine made “an omelette” it took a whole double lesson and I had to teach her how to actually make one about 6 weeks later.
Weirdly her sister at a different school made Panna cotta with a raspberry coulis 😲 it was amazing!

@FreedomandPeace same for me in the 80's!!! 😂

As a Scout leader... I can unfortunately tell you that many children are not allowed to use anything more dangerous than a butter knife ay home, or use a kettle or a toaster.

School cooking will seem extremly basic to someone who has been taught from a young age.

My first Home Economics class in 1980 weeks made chocolate cornflakes cakes. Perfect!

It was his first lesson and he’s made some food. I’d say that was a successful lesson. How long are his lessons? One hour? Once they have arrived at the food room for the first time they have:
1 been directed to their allocated place
2 had the register taken
3 been shown where to store bags and blazers
4 been shown where the aprons are and how to put one on then helped each other to tie their aprons if needed
5 faffed around finding bobbles to tie hair back
6 had it explained to them which is washing up liquid and which is soap, made to wash their hands and been instructed to use the paper towels to dry their hands
7 shown where the bins are for general waste to put their paper towels in and which ones are for food waste only
8 shown how to clean their tables down with a damp dishcloth whilst the teacher and/or technician have to deal with the children that have flooded their work areas with water
9 been made aware of general safety rules in the food room and behaviour expectations
10 talked through the practical they will be doing and demonstrated where necessary.
11 been shown where to find the equipment they will need
12 If using knives they will have been shown the correct knife hold and all the rules for using and collecting knives
13 if using the ovens gone through electrical safety, how to use the ovens and use of oven gloves
14 carry out the practical task
15 told how their work area should look before leaving
16 told how to wash up (fill sink with hot NOT cold water, small amount of washing up liquid,, stack dishes at side opposite to draining board, don’t mix clean and dirty dishes together, wash dirtiest things last, place clean items on draining board, dry up etc)
17 had their equipment inspected and made to redo if not clean and/or dry
18 labelled their food and placed in fridge if need until the end of the day
19 taken their aprons off and hung them up correctly.

A lot of learning has taken place and new routines started to be embedded. It’s great that they actually produced anything. Yes, it might have been nice on a muffin or some ciabatta but it’s the end of the school year and budgets are spent. Teachers are probably trying to use up leftovers.