Educating and Licenses

Some of the fresh ingredients.. (notice they even use fresh herbs)

Learning to properly fold a kitchen towel (an then tuck it into the apron)

Peeling and then shredding up the carrots

They even use a compost for all of the organic waste

Making the dressing from scratch too...

Notice the sharp knives (with the 15 cm blade) that the kids had to bring in :-) Everyone knew how to behave, there were no accidents and it was no big deal (even with 20 kids carrying knives to school :-))

shaking up the salad dressing

All of the ingredients for the noodle salad

mixing it all up weel

This weeks finished product (they cooked different things each week - I was just there to observe on "noodle salad day :-))

Recipe for homemade dressing

Sometimes I ask how a culture can be so "good." They follow the rules, they know what to expect, and how to do things. The kids are taught to do things thoroughly at an early age and so they all really learn the rules.  I've mentioned the bike course, the cooking class, and the bus training, but I'm not sure if I have mentioned the "Licenses." Mia just completed her cooking course, and received her "license" with her photo on it that proves that she has been trained to cook. The license isn't some little prop/reward, but a valued item that actually means something in the society. Later this year, she will train for the swimming "license" (4-5 months of training in fact). The swimming license ensures that she knows the rules, is a properly trained swimmer, and go to the pool and swim by herself. Next year, she will receive her bike license, which gives her the legal right to ride by herself on the main road (for ex. this year, she can walk or ride a scooter to school by herself legally, but she cannot ride her bike to school alone yet, without a parent).   After the bike course (4th grade), she could legally ride her bike to the pool and swim by herself without an an adult nearby - because at that point she would have her licenses for both things. Because this has been done forever in their society, the rules are followed by most everyone (the adults received the same training when they were kids). They don't really have many problems with people not observing the rules.  The courses are given by certified professionals (so for example, the police give the bike and bus course, a special cooking professional who is specially trained for 3 grade instruction, gives the cooking course (not just the normal teacher). This is the important part... EVERY student in EVERY school receives the same special training at the same age. It isn't the whim of a teacher to teach this course in their own class - it is the standard of the country. The instructors are extremely thorough and teach even many of the common sense aspects (just because it can't be assumed that everyone has common sense :-) The kids want their license, and so they really pay attention and learn. This way of doing things in a society makes so much sense to me!!! (The photos above were from one of the cooking class days - parents were invited to attend - there were about 6 in all, finishing with a buffet cooked alone by the class - including fancy napkins, place settings and all :-))