A Recipe for a shopping adventure with Grade 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today was the BIG day; the children from my son Siddharths’ class were going on a field trip. It was not any old field trip, no such thing!! It was a Shopping Trip to buy groceries so that they could make healthy snacks for themselves. How fun!

This trip has been many weeks in the making, with the children planning the menu, making out their grocery list and a budget all set in readiness a week in advance. Moms and Dads were called in to support the children in their shopping adventure and the recipe for a great deal of confusion, noise, a lot of fun and some learning was concocted.

The ingredients were:

Class Teacher – Qty 4(A,C,E,F)

Class of 2^nd graders – Qty 4.

Parents – 4 or 5 per class.

List of ingredients to buy.

Money

Method: Take a class of 2^nd graders; assign 5 or 6 of them to 1  parent. Give the parent a set of questions to ask, a list of items to buy and some money. Each combination of parent + children is assigned a different food group to buy and study. Put them in a bus and stir(bumpy ride) them all the way to Hypercity. Introduce the mixture into the store in an orderly manner and allow each group to search for, collect and pay for the items on their list. Once done, reintroduce everyone to the bus, top up with a nice box of Frooti and return to school.

The whole concept of getting the kids to make their own healthy snacks from scratch is I felt an amazing learning tool. These are the life skills that do matter in the long term. When a child is able to look at, touch and recognize what he or she is eating and how it will help them grow, so many aspects of the subject of nutrition come alive. To me this was a one of the best Biology/nutrition classes ever. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and I may have gone overboard with the questioning and the instructing because one of the kids wanted to know which grades’ class teacher I was!! To my mind that was a massive compliment as it put me in the same category as all the great teachers at Oakridge.

Ms.Vani

Mom to Siddharth Bhargav II C