Bun Lessons
The holidays are over, but, luckily, the ways in which food can teach us about the world are not! Here are some fun ways to include math, science, and language lessons when making buns.
A note on the recipe… The recipe I’m using comes for The New McCall’s Cookbook by Mary Eckley. The version of the cookbook my mom has, the one in the pictures below, isn’t available on Amazon – though you may be able to find it in a used bookstores. This recipe is another example of how recipes sometimes become hard to find with time! Check out my post on Reading Recipes for more on how recipes are passed down and evolve over time.
Math Lessons
Making buns like these potato rolls is a great way to include mathematical language in authentic situations. While cutting out the dough, you can easily reference terms like circles, circumference, diameter, portions, triangles, and ratios.
Of course, dough isn’t completely stable. Even once it’s rolled out, it shifts and shrinks. You can easily integrate words like elasticity, malleability, and consistency while observing the way the dough behaves. If you want to get more scientific about the process, you can always use a silicone rolling mat and make yourself a template to cut out the triangles or squares. In doing so, you can discuss measurements in inches or centimetres.
If you want to get even more technical, you can weigh out your pieces of dough with an electric kitchen scale.
All in all, making buns offers opportunities to show kids and students that math exists in the real world and that precision depends not only on formula and measurement, but also on other factors that need to be accounted for by science.
Science Lessons
Any science-based activity allows people to practice their scientific inquiry skills: asking questions, making predictions, drawing connections… Having these conversations in the kitchen will translate to other aspects of life.
Dough like this one needs to rise and needs to be punched down so it can be rolled out. This rising action is a process of the fermentation that takes place as the yeast consumes the sugar in the recipe and the flour. The light and airy texture of a successful dough is related to the kneading process. Thus there’s an element of force that factors into good buns.
Bread recipes are a great way to discuss variables! For the yeast to be activated, recipes often call for warm water and sugar. I especially love the precise temperature called for in this recipe and the fact that the author suggests rinsing the bowl with warm water to keep the liquid from cooling too quickly. If you want to dig into variables, a fun science experiment can be to play with water temperature to see what happens to yeast if the water is too hot or too cold.
Once predictions are made, add yeast and watch what happens! Discuss the ways in which temperature and other variables affect results.
Rising times will vary depending on the temperature of the room so you can also play around with this temperature-related variable by placing the dough in the fridge, in different rooms in your house, and/or in a warm oven. All these variables will change the outcome of your dough and can lead to great conversations about the way the weather affects other types of construction. What does it take for metal to bend or snap, for example? What can you do in summer versus winter?
Lots of things happen with dough: measuring, mixing, kneading… All of these variables will also affect the end results.
English Language Arts
Because we’re always talking, reading, and/or writing, you can connect the English Language Arts with almost everything and making bread is no exception. Not only do you get to use a lot of mathematical and scientific language, but you can also work on parts of speech like knowing the difference between verbs, nouns, and adjectives. Here are just a few ideas to get you started:
You can even use the surface of your counter to play hangman and practice these words while you wait for your dough to rise or have people call out the actions as you perform them in a real-life game of charades. Have fun! Be a bit silly!
Book Recommendation
My post wouldn’t feel complete without a book recommendation and given the nature of these activities, I feel a really good complimentary text would be any version of Goldilocks and the Three Bears you can find. This fairy tale is all about getting things “just right” so have fun trying different things out in your house with different people or write your own version of the story using the scientific experiments you tried while making bread!
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