Reading · Grade 1–2 to Grade 7–8
Our family recipe card
A family recipe written down by your child, that someone else made from the card.
Your child asks the family's cook for a dish, writes it on a card with a picture, a list and the steps, and someone new makes it from the card. From 5–6 they fix the card where the tester got stuck.
- Grade 1–2 to Grade 7–8
- 50 min
- A printout
- On the screen
Free to sign up.
Is it a good fit?
- Ready if Your child can write a short list and a few sentences in order.
- Too much today? The 1–2 level: the card, and someone says the steps back.
- Too easy? The 7–8 level: tested, fixed, and the recipe's story kept.
What your child practises
- Asking and listening
- Writing steps in order
- Testing writing on a reader
“Grandma said a pinch of salt, so I wrote how much a pinch is.”
If your child says something like this, in their own words, the idea has landed. Finishing the rounds means they took part; this is the learning.
Your part
- Ask the family's cook to share one dish
- Cook alongside the tester for the test, with the knife and the hob yours
- Two sittings
What you need
From home
- A sheet of card
- A pencil
- Felt pens
- A scrap of paper for notes
- The recipe's ingredients, for the test (a grown-up's)
The steps
Grade 1–2
Ask your family's cook for one dish they make often: what goes in, how much of each, and what they do first, next and last. Write it on your notes.
Ask your family's cook for one dish they make often: what goes in, how much of each, and what they do first, next and last. Write it on your notes.The other 4 steps, each with its painting, are in the Family portal.
It must pass: Someone else can tell you what to do first, next and last from your card.
Grade 3–4
- Ask your family's cook for one dish they make often: what goes in, how much of each, and what they do first, next and last. Write it on your notes.
The other 5 steps, each with its painting, are in the Family portal.
It must pass: Someone who has never made the dish makes it from your card, with you there to answer.
Grade 5–6
- Ask your family's cook for one dish they make often: what goes in, how much of each, and what they do first, next and last. Write it on your notes.
The other 5 steps, each with its painting, are in the Family portal.
It must pass: Someone makes it from your card, and you fixed the card where they got stuck.
Grade 7–8
- Ask your family's cook for one dish they make often: what goes in, how much of each, and what they do first, next and last. Write it on your notes.
The other 5 steps, each with its painting, are in the Family portal.
It must pass: Someone makes it from your card, you fixed it where they got stuck, and the card keeps where the recipe comes from.
Safety
The cooking in the test is done with a grown-up there, who uses the knife and the hob or oven. Leave out a dish with anything someone at home is allergic to. The recipe stays at home: the screen never asks for the dish, the cook or the family's names.
Where the facts come from
More like this
The full design
What it is
Your child asks the family's cook for one dish, writes it on a card with a picture, a list of what goes in and the steps in order, and then tests it: someone who has never made the dish makes it from the card. Where they get stuck is what gets fixed. The screen shows one step at a time as a painting of that step and asks at the end. The card, and the dish made from it, are the make.
How it goes
One step fills the screen: the painted plate of that step, the words under it, and two buttons. Done this step moves on. Too hard, skip it also moves on, and the finish says how many were skipped without dressing it up. At the end, Show asks what is true (someone made it from my card, I fixed a step), and What I learned asks the band's question.
The Pet
Asks at each step: "One thing per step. In order." Notices: "Made from your card. Their questions show what to fix." Remembers across the two sittings. It never asks what the dish is or who the cook is.
By band
1 to 2: ask, write the list and the steps, draw the dish, and read it to someone who says back what comes first, next and last. 3 to 4: your child watches the cook first, and someone new cooks from the card with your child there to answer. 5 to 6: the card is tested and fixed where the tester got stuck. 7 to 8: the card also keeps the recipe's story, who taught it to whom.
What it grows
A review of cooking with children aged 4 to 12 found gains in cooking confidence; none measured reading or writing, so this page claims the writing is practised for a real reader, not that the cooking teaches it. A card someone else uses is what project frameworks call an authentic product, and fixing it after a test is their critique and revision.
Done, and what counts as evidence
Done = the steps done or honestly skipped, and one line chosen at the end. The evidence is the card, and from 3 to 4 a reader who made the dish from it: writing judged by whether it works, and from 5 to 6 revised where it did not.
What's personal
The recipe, the dish and the family's names are never typed or stored. Your child's answers about the card are stored as their answer, not as a mark. A material you do not have is named once, a substitute is offered, and the project carries on.