French Cuisine

The French teacher contacted all the parents and asked if we could help her on a "cooking day" with the kids. Another lady and I responded that we could.

She told us to come at the beginning of the day and just wait for the morning lessons to be over, and then we would all walk to the cafeteria to "cook."  

I don't speak French, but the other mother does.

The teacher wrote the recipe on the board in French and all the students had to copy it down and recite it a few times.

Next she started writing something, and I saw the words "Keira" and "maman," and I got a little nervous.

The next thing I know, the kids are grinning, looking at us, and then they start working.

And then they start showing the teacher what they have drawn.

I couldn't type the words into google translate at the time because I was trying to be engaged, but later at home, I was able to use my app to translate what it said:

Keira's mom and Aryana's mom are in the class.  They are seated on small chairs. They eat a cake.  They cat is under the table.



It wasn't quite like sitting for a portrait painting, but it was a little intimidating to have 23 second graders drawing pictures of you :)

The teacher paired up the students and gave each table of four a bowl and a wooden spoon.

Everything was in French, but at one point the teacher told me in broken English, "These kids have never been in the kitchen before.  They don't know how to mix, get their hands dirty, cut, or cook.  This is a shame!"

I'd say they picked it up rather quickly.

I would go to each table to help them finish rolling out the dough or add more flour or whatever they needed.

Most of the time, I spent peeling apples for the kids, so they could cut them into small pieces. They really liked the cutting part, but there were only a couple of knives per table, so the cutting took a long time. Plus, some of these kids really had never used a knife before, so it went really slowly.

November 13, 2019

I'm really not sure what they ended up making :)

They filled the dough pan with apples, and that was it.  No topping, no sugar, no cinnamon.  They just went out to recess while I cleaned up.

Later, Keira said the teacher baked them in the school ovens, but before cooking, she added a coin to each one.  

All I know is that Keira didn't like it, so I guess we won't be recreating it at home ;)