This week, I was looking into a health and nutrition curriculum for the olders. I've had several in mind, I already have the Real Food Nutrition by Food Renegade. Actually, I have both, the one for the kids as well. I've also been eyeballing the one from the Human Bodies Detectives site. I don't remember how I got introduced to this curriculum; I was so tempted to buy it a few months ago when it was on sale at the Homeschool Buyer's Co-op. But, I talked myself out of it, just because Little Miss isn't quite there yet, even though the purpose of getting it was because she was asking all sorts of questions about blood and the heart and how the food worked in the digestive tract. I appeased my urge to buy the full curriculum with purchasing the iPad apps, which she LOVED. They were like books on tape in a way; it was the book, being read to you, interactively. (I also have that theme song stuck in my head, every time I say or think "Human Body Detectives" I can't not add an "ooh-ooh-ooh-ohoh, Human Body Detectives!" to it. "Yeah!") So; the curriculum is regularly $79. On the HSBC, it's on sale for $29.95 (plus whatever the co-op fee is). I found it on Teachers Pay Teachers last week on sale, I believe it was 10% off. THEN I was given a code for an addition 10% off. So, I got both the Middle School/High school nutrition AND the Teen Health ebooks for around the same price as the single nutrition curriculum from the HSBC. Pretty cool.
So, after looking over all the pages, I really like the looks of it; at the same time, I'm not sure it counts as a full credit hour. I'm thinking about combining the two, Real Food Nutrition and the HBD Nutrition, just to have a little extra slant to the WAPF way of eating (from the Real Food Nutrition book). I'm thinking this, all together, equals half a credit. Which is fine. But, why not add a cooking 101 curriculum to go along with all this health and nutrition information? Ms. Artsy already does a LOT of cooking around here. Most of it is under our direction, of course, but she's pretty good at picking up a recipe book and making it work with few interventions from us. However, I do think that everyone can benefit from learning a little bit more about cooking, and I'm now in the process of looking for some curriculum ideas for cooking 101. (Anti-insanity Tip: It's always better to see if it's already been done before, rather than re-invent the wheel, so to speak. You can find multiple options, and pick and choose what works best for you and your goals, without making yourself crazy with the huge enormous task of creating one from scratch all by yourself.) So, here are a few links that I'm saving to determine what I want to put together to make a half-credit cooking course. (A credit hour, debatably, is 120-160 hours). So I'm looking at 60-80 hours in the kitchen, and 60-80 hours of health and nutrition study.
Cooking 101: 20 Lessons
Basic Cooking Lessons
Alton Brown Curriculum - Already have the books. Can totally watch a bunch of "Good Eats" for inspiration!
MIT Kitchen Chemistry
MIT Advanced Kitchen Chemistry
Forum Post on Cooking and Science
A Pinterest Board with LOTS of ideas
High School Curriculum
Great Courses - This one is more nutrition based, and it has potential, although there are some things that I don't agree with (like "it's all about the calories!" and "Drink your cereal milk" and "watch out for the shine; unnecessary fats"). But it has potential.
Coursera - The Science of Gastronomy
American Test Kitchen - This may be worth paying for for a few months! Principles
MIT Speak Italian with your mouth full
I believe this one is done by a former home ec teacher
Epicurious
Top Chef University
I'm really loving the look of that American Test Kitchen.
Some of my goals in the class include, but not limited to:
Knife skills
meal planning (this can actually be a part of the nutrition course, have her "create" balanced meal plans, and then we can use the cooking course to learn to create and prepare the meals)
reading a recipe (she pretty much has this down pat)
freezer cooking
canning
dehydrating
fermenting (of course!)
herb identification
safety in the kitchen
Wow, I've found a lot of stuff already. I found some information here with ideas on beefing up the health aspect, as well, so the cooking could actually be a full credit elective!
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