Holiday Cooking Class

Teaching your students to cook is a valuable life skill to pass on and a great family fun activity. Gingerbread people are a holiday tradition that helps your student to learn to bake, measure and follow written instructions while giving them the opportunity to exercise their creative side. Gingerbread people also make great gifts from young students to friends and family members.

When students follow recipes, they get invaluable practice that will stand them in good stead in the lab. Scientific experiments are very much like recipes. Students learn to read the instructions through from start to finish first. Then follow each step. They also learn to measure and add ingredients one at a time, just like they would in a scientific experiment.

Students also learn how to follow a recipe and basic baking terms like stirring, folding, sifting etc.

Here is a basic gingerbread recipe:

Ingredients:

·         5 cups all-purpose flour

·         1 teaspoon baking soda

·         1/2 teaspoon salt

·         2 teaspoons ground ginger

·         1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

·         1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

·         1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

·         1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature

·         1 cup packed light brown sugar

·         1 large egg

·         1 cup unsulfured molasses

·         1 teaspoon vanilla

Method:

Sift the dry ingredients into a large bowl. In another bowl, beat the sugar and butter together until creamy. Add the egg and beat for another 30 seconds. Add molasses and beat for 2 minutes. Add vanilla and beat for 30 seconds.

Take one cup of dry ingredients at a time and add them to the butter mixture. Every time you add a cup of dry ingredients, stir until well mixed. When you have added all the dry mixture, stir until you have a stiff dough. Use your hands to roll the dough into a big ball. Press down with your palm onto the dough to flatten it. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 2 hours.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Lightly flour your countertop and your rolling pin. Roll out the dough until 1/8 inch thick. Use cookie cutters to cut out your gingerbread people. Place on a greased baking sheet and bake for 12 minutes.

Take the cookies out of the oven and let them cool completely. Now decorate with icing and candy.

You can use the same recipe to make gingerbread houses. Put the dough on floured parchment paper and then roll it out. Cut out squares or rectangles that are the same size for the four walls and two sides of the roof. Bake in the same way and leave to cool. Use icing sugar to secure the four walls to each other and then put the roof on. Decorate with candy and icing sugar.

What do you think about these gift ideas for your wonderful teachers?

Teaching is an often thankless yet very important job. If anyone deserves a gift this holiday season, we'd say teachers should be first on the list. But what do they really want?

Festive gifts show your teacher a little love for all that they have done for your kids this year. Teachers often go above and beyond the call of duty to guide and educate your children and it makes their efforts worth it when parents and students express their appreciation. You don’t have to spend a lot of money; just a little thoughtfulness and care is all you need to give a gift that makes your teacher feel special. Whatever you decide to get for your favorite teachers, make sure it’s personal.

Teachers really want one gift in particular: a heartfelt thank you. Homemade gifts from their students or handwritten thank you notes are the kind of presents a teacher will cherish for years to come.

Don’t forget the specialty teachers. Teachers who focus on subjects like music, art, gym and more often go unnoticed. Recognize their hard work and they are sure to be appreciative!

Gift cards

Vouchers and gift cards allow your favorite teachers to buy things they really need or want. Get your children to create handmade cards for their favorite educators and pop the gift cards inside.

Personalized stationary

Always a classy gift, give your teacher their very own personalized stationary for letters, notes and cards.

Teacher’s survival kit

From coffee to chocolate, every teacher can use a little survival kit for those early mornings. Include a coffee travel mug with specialty coffees, cookies, chocolates and other treats that can help a teacher through a tough morning.

Good books

Most teachers will enjoy a good read. You can buy books for the classroom so that they have a little more variety in the reading corner or get them some books you know they will enjoy. Not sure what your teacher reads? Buy a gift voucher from a local or online book store.

Holiday cookies

Have fun with your kids and create a personal gift for your favorite teachers by baking a batch of festive cookies. You can bake a few batches of different cookies if you have a number of teachers to think of. Then you can give them a selection of treats to enjoy over the holidays.

Plants

Living gifts are a great way to make a lasting impression. Plants not only reduce stress, they also improve indoor air quality.

Movie theater gift card

Who doesn’t like going to the movies? Give your teachers a chance to unwind and relax in the new year with a gift voucher to a local cinema.

Monogrammed gifts

Get your kids to monogram items with their teacher’s name or initials. Scarves and hats, handkerchiefs, coffee mug cozies, and mittens will all look better with a little handy work.

Candles

You can make these yourself with a little beeswax and a mold. Making candles is a great holiday activity and they make brilliant gifts.

Spa gifts

This festive season, everyone can give a little love to their mistle-toes! Give gift vouchers to local spas or make up your own little kit with bath and spa products so that your teachers can give themselves a little pampering. 

The most important factor in your holiday gift to the teachers who do so much for you is personalization. Get your kids to pick out gifts and write their own cards and notes that express their appreciation for a job well done.

Do you have a favorite teacher at Fall River? Do you know a sensational teacher at Silver Creek?

Resolving Student-Teacher Conflicts

by Patti Ghezzi 

It’s tough when a child says “My teacher hates me, and I hate her, too,” but it’s bound to happen at least once in every student’s educational life. Here are some tips for what parents can do.

Over the course of a long educational career, your child is probably going to get at least one teacher she really doesn’t like. And she’ll very likely insist the teacher hated her first.
Maybe her teacher calls on her when she clearly doesn’t know the answer and embarrasses her. Maybe she marks up your child’s papers with copious amounts of red ink and encourages her to change her writing style. Or maybe the teacher just doesn’t lavish attention on her the way she does on other students.
What’s a parent to do?
Here’s what not to do, says Cynthia Ulrich Tobias, author of I Hate School: How To Help Your Child Love Learning and other education books. First, don’t hand the teacher a book—even one by Tobias—and demand she read it. “That’s not how you approach a teacher,” says Tobias, who once gathered 100 educators to discuss how parents should approach them without them feeling defensive.
Second, don’t ambush the teacher at the parent-teacher conference with complaints about how she treats your child. Instead, if your child has a big problem with the teacher and can’t resolve it himself, try building a relationship with the teacher based on respect and trust. Once you have a relationship, you will be in a better position to get the teacher’s cooperation in creating a better learning environment for your child.
Here are some other ideas for helping your child deal with a teacher he doesn’t like:

• ·         The best way to begin a conversation with a teacher about a problem is with “What can I do?” This approach shows the teacher you don’t expect him to fix the problem alone, Tobias says.
• ·         Shift responsibility to your child by helping your child find ways to approach her teacher without alienating her. For example, your child could say “I’m having a hard time concentrating because it’s too noisy. What can I do?”
• ·         Remind your child that he’ll have many teachers in his lifetime and that not all of them will jibe with his learning style. “You’re not always going to find a teacher who teaches exactly the way you learn,” Tobias says, noting that it’s a valuable life lesson.
• ·         Remember that your child’s teacher is much more likely to respond to a concern if you have already established a relationship with her and have a history of being an involved parent.
• ·         Even when you are furious at your child’s teacher, treat her with respect. “They’ll treat your child as well as you treat them,” says Tobias, who was a classroom teacher for many years and also sat on the other side as a parent of twin boys.
• ·         Recognize that teacher-child clashes often represent differences in personality style. Children who need structure and predictability may not get along with a freeform teacher who goes with the flow. And the free-spirited child may react negatively to a teacher who sets firm boundaries and adheres to a list of strict rules. Try to convince your child she can learn from someone who has a different style.
• ·         When your child says her teacher doesn’t like her, ask for specific examples. Then you can determine whether she is exaggerating the conflict or whether a problem really exists.
• ·         Role-play with your child so she’ll feel more comfortable talking to her teacher about the problems she’s having. For example, if she thinks the teacher embarrasses her by calling on her when she doesn’t know the answer, practice talking it over with the teacher. Have your child play herself as well as the teacher.
• ·         Work with the chain of command: First talk to the teacher, then the principal, then the superintendent, and then your elected board member. Going straight to the school board with your complaint will not help.
• ·         Resist the temptation to request a reassignment if at all possible. Instead, ask the principal for “a little insight” into why she chose a particular teacher for your child, says Tobias. She admits that her sons were often assigned teachers she wouldn’t have chosen. But the principal turned out to be right.

When your child hates her teacher and is convinced the teacher hates her, it can make for a long, miserable year for everyone. By working with your child to try to resolve the issue, you show her you care about her feelings and are truly in her corner, even when she’s at school—and you help her gain valuable interpersonal skills that will serve her for a lifetime.

Journalist Patti Ghezzi covered education and schools for 10 years for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She lives in Avondale Estates, Ga., with her family, which includes husband Jason, daughter Celia, and geriatric mutt Albany.