Research Process 5 - Corn Fritters and Salsa at the Kai Festival

The students in this class decided to make corn fritters and salsa to go with them. Way back last year they thought that they would grow the corn for the festival and that fritters made from that corn would be their dish. We are Carla, Edward and Raukura and there are two things that stand out for us from our festival experiences.

The first is with the help of Mr K we made a hydroponics unit for inside the classroom out of plastic drink bottles. This was to grow the herbs for the salsa and the fritters. We also grew some herbs in our class garden and the school hydroponics unit. We had to experiment with different ways to stop the algae growing on the bottles and we found that wrapping paper around the bottle was the best thing to do this. We grew coriander in our hydroponics in the classroom.

The other thing that we remember is making the robots out of the tins cans. Well you see the sweet corn didn’t grow as well as we thought because it was a bit dry this year and so we had to make our fritters using tinned corn. But we made these robots using the cans to make up the robot. We were recycling the cans.

In our inquiry books we did labels for our food items, we googled a recipe for the salsa and we made posters to advertise the festival. Since the festival we have brainstormed how we should use the money and reviewed the jobs at the festival.

Some thoughts from each of us:

Carla

I haven’t really changed anything at home since we started doing the things for the festival. I have a small garden at home.

I hadn’t done experiments before we did this so the most significant thing for me was the experiments. I think I might get to use them again as we are doing the ecological island and there is going to be a science room on the island. I would call my story The Kai Festival.

Ed

The change for me at home was that I helped my Poppa to make some hydroponics. He’s got a garden and he’s got like a little hydroponics, a weed sprayer, his own compost too, and a hot house, two hot houses. Poppa and I worked together on this we like plant tomatoes. He even planted a tomato the size of his hand. The difference for is like that my Poppa isn’t, hasn’t really made hydroponics before and he hasn’t really heard of it only on the TV guide.

The tin can plan was really significant for me and hydroponics in the room was something new. From here I think we could get more cans and make a skink kingdom on the ecological island. We could vote for the best skink playground.

I would call my story The Experience of the Kai Festival.

Raukura

I don’t know if there is a change for me at home I have a garden at home and I water it every morning. Actually I do have a change I had a change I knew that I had to water my gardens every day otherwise if I didn’t they would eventually they would. I have these and they are going really well and they’re called guava’s growing well close to the lemon –sometimes I think they are a couple but sometimes I think they are sharing roots to be healthy.

The most significant thing for me has been the Green Team and the thinking about the animals for the Ecological Island. We are thinking whether to put an arch bridge over it or digging underneath it and putting glass so that we can see, not letting us drown or anything.

I think that we are thinking about the animals that will eat the plants on the island and if other classes had cans left over we could plant animal food in the cans and then put on the ecological island. It need lost of plants.

An innovative thing we have been doing is thinking about hiding from predators and camouflage on the island.

I would call my story Our Kai Festival.

Story number	006
Title	Corn Fritters and Salsa
Date	10-12 April 2013
Person recording	Faye
Storyteller(s)	Students Carla aged 8 (f), Edward aged 8 (m), Raukura aged 8 (f)
Feedback Faye	d) Developing the concept of sustainability as a reality Students in this story are beginning to experience some of the ideas embodied in sustainability. For example they plan to use their own corn for their dish at the festival but learn along the way that seasonal cycles can dictate the quality of the harvest. Then they experience the need for adaptability and flexibility to change when the corn harvest doesn’t eventuate as planned. In this case they adapt by using another source - the tinned corn. The opportunity from the tins has been to grow plants for the ecological island and have some fun with making robots, thus re-using a resource. I am wondering about the degree to which students understand what they have done includes these aspects of sustainability?
Feedback Robyn	d) Developing the concept of sustainability as a reality In this story I feel that the students are trying to make sense of all these things happening. I think that they could be on the cusp of seeing the connections between the different projects that they are involved in – but they are not there yet.
Feedback Wendy	d) Developing the concept of sustainability as a reality This story describes some fantastic learning – lots of problem solving, testing, hypothesising, and research.  The fact they recognised they had created waste through using cans, and then took action to create something from that waste shows they are making links and deepening their understanding of sustainability.  The can robots was a very creative and positive response to what could have been a sad situation – unsuccessful corn growing.  There is clearly a lot of transfer of gardening skills and interest between home and school with a number of students commenting on their own gardens.