October 06th, 2022

10/6/2022

Chipotle for our friend Remy

For her birthday meal, Remy was deciding between two of her favorite meals - oatmeal and 'Chipotle' (tacos) and ultimately chose the latter.
Together with her mom Katie, she recorded a video message for the birthday committee in which she's sharing her preferences and how to best prepare her favorite meal.

T H E I N G R E D I E N T S

That was a crazy one! - Wilder
It was fun I guess. How to make her birthday meal we need... - Lily
Tortillas. I forget what we put it. - Wilder
We mash up the avocados in guacamole. - Lily
I love it! - Wilder
And we warm up rice and we buy cheese. - Lily
Is it string cheese? - Wilder
Cheddar cheese but the sprinkled kind. - Remy
The white sprinkles. - Wilder
And there's orange sprinkles. - Lily

Our small group conversation about the different ingredients and their preparation led to a reflection on where we can find these ingredients, where they come from and how they are made.

C H E E S E

Lily: Milk.
Wilder: From cows!
Ines: And how does it come from the cow to the grocery store?
Frannie: The farmers!
Wilder: The farmers milk the cows and then put it in a bottle and then like a message send it to the grocery store. And they drive it to the grocery store.
Ines: Wow! How do you know all of that?
Wilder: I guessed.
Ines: Have you seen a cow before?
Lily: No. I mean, yes!
Frances: Noo.
Wilder: One day I actually became a real cowboy and I actually rided a cow. In Montana where there’s lots of cows and horses. And I rided a horse all the way up the falls and then a cow all the way up the falls.
Lily: Why is it called cowboys and they don’t ride cows?
Wilder: I rided a cow and a horse all the way up the falls in two hours.

A V O C A D O S

Wilder: We’re growing avocados at my house. Two are already ripe. She just said homemade and that’s home. They grow next to the tomatoes and they grow in soil and two are already ripe because they need a lot of water to grow. Well it took very close to those two, it took like 3 hours. It looks like leaves, stick. With a vine tangling around the stick. I will try to take a picture but it’s over a fence where our farm is so it might to hard to see. Up up up up, down down down down and then you need to walk walk walk walk and then you need to pick them right off the plants. And then I can take it home and put it in a bag and bring it to school but I need to climb over a whole fence. So we need to get a little ladder.

R I C E

Frances: Like tomatoes?
Wilder: It looks like little skinny cheez-its.
Frances: No,no. It looks like cheese.
Ines: But is it cheese? Is it a fruit? A vegetable?
Wilder: No. It’s plain, so definitely something that comes from the ground. Because it’s plain.
Lily: I have no idea! It grows from a tree?
Wilder: I think it grows from the ground by itself.
Ines: Underneath the ground or above the ground?
Wilder: Above the ground because it’s never dirty.
Frances: Above!

After we formed some of our own ideas and hypothesis around rice we decided to use google search as a tool to further research the origins of rice. Lily suggested to type in "Where does rice come from?"
This led us to the following video:

While watching the video for a second time, Wilder was interested in identifying, selecting and verbally repeating critical information he gathered from the video. In the beginning he instructed Ines to use her notebook to write down said information so we could remember it better after the video ended. The following quotes were written down during this time:

Lily: A map!
Wilder: India! Write that down (instructing Ines to take down notes about the video).
...
Wilder: That’s good to know. Because it’s very warm here. Everyday except winter. Then it’s cold. (reflecting on temperature requirements to grow rice)
Ines: So would the rice grow well here?
Frances: No.
...
Wilder: Usually it like with tons of water. They like a lot of water so the leaves don’t tangle around.
...
Lily: What does that do? (about an ox plowing the ground)
Wilder: Flatting out the mud.
...
Wilder: (Rice needs) plenty of space to grow. 3 months to grow.
...
Lily: What does harvest mean?
Wilder: It means you pick it yourself.
Lily: Are they trying to get the rice here?
Wilder: Rice is hiding. They’re ripping out.
...
Wilder: The fields gets harvested by hand. And then you bonk it on that so all the rice falls out and the sun dries it out.
...
Frances: So much rice!
Lily: But they’re stepping on the rice.
Wilder: No. Look! There’s little paths. With the rocks.
...
Lily: Large silos?
Wilder: That’s where it’s stored.
...
Lily: What does harvest mean?
Wilder: It means you pick it yourself.
...

How can we share all the information we just gathered?

Wilder suggested sharing the notes we wrote down by reading them out loud to everyone. In addition to that Lily had the idea to draw pictures so everyone would be able to 'read' them. The group identified moments that seemed most important to them and drew them. The next day we matched our drawings with the corresponding images from the video and discussed their chronological sequence.

When the birthday committee discussed the required ingredients and 'taco toppings', the idea of creating a menu for the celebration came up:

How many avocados do we need to make guacamole?
Wilder: Four.
Lily: No, I think two. No a hundred.
Frances: Oh I know. A thousand.
Remy: No, not a thousand, wrong guess. (Remy walking over from easel area)
Ines: How many do you use at home, Remy?
Remy: I’ve never made it before.
Wilder: Then why did you say homemade if you never even heard of it?
Remy: Well my mom told me. Okay, one avocado, two tortillas and if you want you can do beans.
Lily: No, I don’t want to.
Ines: I think she said ‘if you want to’. So it’s optional?
Wilder: Mh! Beans! Beans!
Remy: I like them.
Ines: So it sounds like some friends like beans and some friends don’t.
Remy: Yeah we can do like a menu. I can make my own taco. Do you have any box for food?
Wilder: How about some can be beans some can be no beans.
Lily: How about we do this like we did in Michael’s (pointing to documentation on the board). Like the choices to add.
Ines: Like the choices of toppings? How would we do that for tacos?
Lily: Is the guacamole you just have to do it? Is it optional?
Ines: I think so.
Lily: Okay, can we do the guacamole optional, too? We could do the menu. And then put the food, the options around the food like we did last time (remembering the table set-up at Michael's birthday celebration)
Ines: I wasn’t here on Friday, can you tell me more about it?
Frannie: I don’t remember.
Lily: They were on the spinny thing around it.
Ines: I think that’s called a lazy susan.
*Lily and Frannie looking for lazy susans in the area.
Lily: Oh that’s easy! We can put everything on.

A menu...

It's a sign that has all of the foods. - Frances
You also write and also draw the beans. All has to be on the same paper. - Lily

We need to put them all together and print it. - Lily
Take a picture! - Wilder
We need two for the table here and the table here. - Lily, suggesting to make multiple copies

P R E P A R I N G T H E T A C O T O P P I N G S

G U A C A M O L E

Mash it like banana bread! - Lily
We usually use a fork. - Wilder
It's kinda weird. - Frannie, looking at the avocado pit

It looks like salad. It's great! Let's put some hot sauce on it. - Frances
My dad is the only one who eats hot sauce. - Lily
It looks like green frosting. - Frances

B E A N S

Why is there no beans it? It's melted! - Lily, surprised to not see beans when the can opened

No guys, It's easy. They are in it. See, it's right down there. Put your hand it. Deeper. You see, it's here. - Wilder, gently picking up beans out of can to show they are submerged in water

It makes a sort of sound. Shhh. - Frances
A whizzing sound. - Wilder
It's bubbling. It's cool to see this. It burns! (cooks) - Wilder

Why is it not bubbling on the white spot? - Lily
It's air? - Wilder
Beans? - Lily
It doesn't have the white spot anymore (after stirring) because it mixed in. - Frances

For the rice we used a new tool - a rice cooker!
4, 5. That's how many minutes (identifying the cook time of 45 minutes) - Wilder

Thinking about some of Remy's favorite things, supported the birthday committee in their decision process on how to personalize the table setting and decorations for her birthday meal.

Images that Frances, Lily and Wilder took during their "Irish dancing photo shoot" with Remy:

Lily: Any type of dance!
Frances: Irish dancing.
Lily: Tap dancing and ballet.
Wilder: Take a picture and cut out of Irish dancing.
Frances: We can make people Irish dancing with their hands on their hips.
Wilder: Remy could do the Irish dancing, we take a photo of it and cut it out. I think Remy is the only person who knows how to do that.

Lily, Wilder and Frannie helped Remy taking off her shoes because they weren't the appropriate shoes to perform Irish dancing.

Wow! There's so much Remy. Wow! - Frances

Hugh and Cate noticed the committee's big plan and offered to support the group with cutting out 'the Remys'.

I cut the surrounding of the thing we want in the picture, We need to cut the surrounding out. - Hugh
All of the things that are not Remy, I'm gonna cut. - Frances
When you get to the head you have to turn around. - Lily
My arm is so sore! - Hugh
Let's do a team one. - Wilder, offering to take turns cutting out the same image

We're trying to stand the Remys up. - Wilder
How can a flat piece of paper stand up?
We either have to have something behind it. Like a glue bottle. - Wilder

Lily reflected on past experiences in the classroom to solve this problem. She remembered that we used popsicle sticks before to support cut out photos of the children's favorite dance moves when we were Rainey Room and suggested to try it again in this situation (Popsicle sticks and tape it to the popsicle sticks - Lily)

Since Remy is bigger than the popsicle stick we can put it on the back. - Lily
Her feet can only be taped so she looks like her own size. - Wilder

Including Remy's favorite colors blue and turquoise, Lily, Frances and Wilder thoughtfully decorated small jars for 'the Remys' to stand in or dance on.

She's like at the beach and in the water singing. - Frances
It's like a 'Remy flag'. - Wilder
There's like 3000 Remys! - Frances