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Introduction
Columbus … plantations … emerging cities … airplanes,
railroads, and grocery stores … frozen food …
refrigerators … the Roaring Twenties … the Great
Depression … Route 66 … the 1939 New York World’s Fair …
victory gardens … the baby boom … Julia Child … fusion
cuisine.
Most of us rarely give a second thought to the wealth of
history and culture that shapes our dining habits and
taste preferences. Over the centuries, our recipes,
menus, traditions, and etiquette have been directly
shaped by our nation’s rich immigrant experience,
innovations in food preparation and preservation
technology, and the ever-expanding availability of
foods.
Key Ingredients: America by Food
is a Smithsonian Institution traveling exhibition that
explains the little known, the everyday, and the obvious
through an entertaining and informative overview of our
diverse regional cooking and eating traditions. You and
your students will have the opportunity to visit
Key Ingredients
as it tours your state.
The
Key Ingredients Teacher’s Guide
is designed to help students explore the themes of the
exhibition, discover local food traditions, and
participate in your community’s
Key Ingredients
experience. The guide includes five engaging classroom
lessons as well as a scavenger hunt for students to use
during their visit to the exhibition. The lessons
promote the development of critical thinking skills by
involving students in analyzing both historical
documentsand modern media, conducting history research
projects on their family, state, and nation, and
synthesizing their discoveries for presentation to a
classroom or community audience. Please rely on your
knowledge of your students’ capabilities to decide how
best to adapt a lesson to their needs. Four lessons meet
performance expectations outlined in the national
Curriculum Standards for Social Studies
developed by the National Council for Social Studies,
and one lesson meets standards outlined in the national
Health Education Standards developed by the American
Cancer Society. (See the Appendix for descriptions of
these performance expectations or standards.)
The lessons can be taught either before or after a visit
to the exhibition. Most lessons enable students to
create projects that can be shared with the entire
community, alongside the exhibition. Please contact your
area’s
Key Ingredients
hosts before the exhibition arrives to coordinate plans
for your students’ work to appear with the exhibition.
They may be able to provide valuable resources—such as
the activity brochure that accompanies the exhibition,
serve as guest speakers, and assist your students in
other ways.
We hope you and your students find exploring
Key Ingredients
a rich and exciting educational experience. Visit
www.keyingredients.org
for more information about
Key Ingredients,
a schedule of the exhibition’s tour in your state,
fascinating facts about American food history, and an
ever-growing collection of recipes.
Lesson Format
The
Key Ingredients Teacher’s Guide
lesson plans use readily available materials and require
little advance preparation. Each lesson follows this
format:
Lesson Objectives:
Concepts and skills students will develop in the lesson.
Suggested Grade Levels:
Grade levels for which the lesson can be adapted.
Time Frame:
Approximate amount of time required to complete the
lesson.
Social Studies Performance Expectations:
National performance expectations addressed by the
lesson, by grade level.
Note:
The lesson “We’ll Be Right Back after These Messages” is
keyed to the national
Health Education Standards
rather than the
Curriculum Standards for Social Studies.
Handouts:
Resource packets and activity sheets needed for the
lesson. These pages follow each lesson and should be
duplicated for classroom use.
Supplies:
Materials needed for the lesson.
Setting the Stage:
Step-by-step instructions for a brief discussion that
relates the lesson topic to subjects already familiar to
students and/or assesses students’ prior knowledge of
the topic.
Activity Procedure:
Step-by-step instructions for an activity that
introduces students to the concepts and skills listed in
the lesson objectives and allows students to apply their
new knowledge and skills to meet those objectives.
Extensions:
Some lessons include suggestions for additional
activities that meet the lesson objectives.4
INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION 5
Recipes for Tradition
Setting the Stage
1. Ask students:
Does your family have a “secret recipe”? Does someone in
your family make a dish that is unique or that tastes
better than or different from when other people make it?
2. Explain that foods are part of the traditions that
give our families unique identities and help preserve
our family history. To illustrate this concept, read and
discuss two or three of the stories in
Salsa Stories.
If the book is not available, share a story about your
family’s food traditions with the class that says
something about your family’s heritage. Tell students:
We are going to discover some of the food traditions in
our own families, and collect and share them with
others as a recipe book.
Activity Procedure
1. Ask students to think about foods that are a part of
their family traditions. Brainstorm a variety of reasons
that might make a food or dish special. Remind students
to think of examples from
Salsa Stories.
Reasons may include: an association with their cultural
heritage; their preparation differs from the way other
families make it; the person who prepares the dish or
developed the recipe (e.g., Grandma’s chocolate cake);
the context in which the food is served (e.g., holiday,
birthday, religious ceremony, or camping trip); a story
or event associated with the dish (e.g., the roast
chicken dad cooked for mom on the night he proposed to
her); everyone in the family loves it.
2. Tell students they’ll each be creating a “Recipes for
Tradition” book featuring their family’s recipes.
Explain that they’ll be able to share these recipes with
the community through the
Key Ingredients
exhibition and all over the world on the
Key Ingredients
website. The book should include a cover and at least
five recipes. Each recipe should be accompanied by a
brief story or explanation illustrating the food’s
importance to the student’s family and a photo or
drawing. Encourage students to interview as many family
members as possible when compiling their recipe books.
Students can view examples of recipes and stories on the
“American Cookbook Project” section of the
Key Ingredients
website,
www.keyingredients.org.
Key
Ingredients: America by Food
For additional
lessons and activities you can find the full Teachers
Guide at
www.keyingredients.org.
Key Ingredients: America by Food
is a Museum on Main Street exhibition developed by the
Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service
(SITES).
Museum on Main Street is a partnership of the
Smithsonian Institution and state humanities councils
nationwide that serves small-town museums and citizens.
This innovative project brings rural America
one-of-a-kind access to prestigious Smithsonian
exhibitions and first rate educational humanities
programs. Most importantly, Museum on Main Street
enables rural museums to demonstrate their enormous
talents and their meaningful contributions to small-town
life. Like all Museum on Main Street exhibitions, Key
Ingredients was specifically designed to meet the
needs of small institutions.
To further explore the themes in the exhibition, visit
www.keyingredients.org.
For more information on Museum on Main Street, visit
www.museumonmainstreet.org.
This teacher’s guide was created to accompany
Key Ingredients
and may be duplicated for classroom use.
Writer: Lisa Thompson
Editor: Kate Mitchell
Design: Alexa Davidson, Studio A
© 2003 Smithsonian Institution
www.si.edu
www.statehumanities.com
Cover image and page 1: Patriotic picnic,
Denver, Colorado, about 1910
Charles S. Lillybridge / Colorado Historical Society
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