What Will Make Flour Taste Better?

The Rivers Class students have read a series of books lately that included mention of mills and grains, of threshing and grinding.  The Little Red Hen takes grain to the mill to have it ground into flour for the bread she will make.  In Eric Carle's Pancakes, Pancakes, again the baker cuts wheat and threshes it and grinds it to get the flour to add into the pancakes.

It seemed an interesting concept and we had some wheat berries on hand, so the teachers began to explore how to show children how the seed or berry of the wheat plant becomes this useful ingredient, flour.  The children were delighted to see that a mortar and pestle would, with a great deal of effort, grind down the wheat berries into what was clearly flour.

They wanted to taste the flour, but found that it does not generally have much flavor or a very satisfying texture.

Ms. Sytsma met with a some children to gather ideas about this problem.  Flour is added to bread and pancakes and cakes and those taste delicious.  But the flour itself was not enjoyable.  Several children pointed out that the flour was not mixed with anything and that putting other things in might help.  A list was generated of things that would help the flour taste better. The children said we should try these things:

• Add fruit (Kellan)
• Eggs (Cabot)
• Put it in the oven (Caroline)
• Honey (Nora)
• Sugar, brown sugar is the best (Kirsten)
• Vanilla (Cabot)
• Strawberries.  And some beans.  Actually, not beans. (Henry)

On Wednesday, we gathered to add these ingredients to the flour.  There was much excitement and willingness to try the product.  But everyone agreed that this was still not quite right.

In a class discussion later in the day, one child knew that in order to bake we needed a batter (or dough, added another child) and that this was not batter.  We also thought we might need an expert to help us figure out what a batter is and what we did wrong.

Kellan offered that grandmas know a lot about batters.  And then Ms. Hilton, Cabot's mom and our classroom volunteer for the day, offered that she knows about batters as well.  Ms. Hilton explained that when she is making a batter, she uses a recipe.

So, we are off to find some recipes to figure this all out. "What makes a batter?" is the next question to tackle.

Trying out an idea and failing and making a plan is an important process to master as the children develop as independent learners.