The Italian delegation of Science on Stage 2

Science Menu or experiments à la carte among pans and test tubes

Abstract

Kitchen has always been the ideal laboratory for applied sciences and scientists, with their contribution, have influenced everyday cooking up to modern molecular gastronomy. As kitchen is familiar to students, it is useful for science teachers to exploit it as a resource to provide their students with different activities which are also interesting, informative and scientifically correct. The project is aimed at: promoting the experimental approach to science even in schools without a lab; encouraging teachers to perform lab activities with the help of structured and indexed materials; issuing a menu of didactical experiments that can be performed with ordinary materials and devices; linking the experiment menu to specific topics of science curricula from primary to lower secondary school; stimulating teachers' creativity and providing them with a didactical framework for new experimental activities. The project's strong points are: the appealing approach to scientific subjects; the integration with curricula at different levels; the links with subjects from Biology, Physics, Chemistry and Earth Science; the integration with the resources on the web (e-learning); the possibility to expand the materials.

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Description

Kitchen has always been the ideal laboratory for applied science. Food preparation has played a role in the development of science and scientists have contributed to the development of cooking, since the invention of pressure cooker to modern molecular gastronomy. As kitchen is well known by students it is useful for science teachers to use it as a resource to provide them with various activities which are interesting, informative and rigorous at the same time.

General aims

• Promoting the experimental approach to Chemistry and Biology even in schools without an equipped lab.
• Encouraging teachers to perform lab activities with the help of structured and indexed materials.
• Issuing a "menu" of didactical experiments that can be performed with ordinary materials and devices.
• Linking the experiment menu to specific topics of science curricula from primary to lower secondary school.
• Stimulating teachers' creativity and providing them with a didactical framework for new experimental activities (according to action-research methodology).

Aims for the students

• Science Menu is aimed at committing pupils (especially the unmotivated ones) in the study of Chemistry (and Biology too) through experimental activities.
• Students usually look at Chemistry as a difficult subject full of obscure concepts while they welcome the possibility to deepen everyday experiences like those regarding cooking, a familiar issue to many of them.
• We hope that these proposals will foster students' natural curiosity and we believe to raise their interest by means of emotional involvement.
• The proposed method is particularly suitable for kids with relational problems: for these students kitchen and food are catalysts for raising interest and motivation and for giving significance to science learning in relationship to real world and personal experience.

An example of the proposed method: the recipe framework

Strong points

• Friendly approach to scientific subjects.
• Integration with science curriculum at different levels (from primary to upper secondary school).
• Link with various Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Earth Science topics.
• Integration with web resources (e-learning).
• Possibility to expand the materials.

To conclude...

If I listen I forget, if I look I understand,
if I do then I learn!

(ascribed to Confucius).

You can access to Science Menu Recipe Book.