Erica M. Mentone
Why chocolate chip cookies? Why not chocolate chip cookies? Everyone loves chocolate chip cookies, and it is a challenge to find anything more engaging to a second grader. Very few things can hold a second graders attention like a chocolate chip cookie. Another thing second graders love - a challenge. Challenging a class to engineer the world's greatest chocolate chip cookie is conceivably the most exciting endeavor a second grader can undertake.
More importantly, the quality of chocolate chip cookies can be evaluated on a larger scale beyond taste. In this unit, it will be important for children to collect and analyze data. I chose chocolate chip cookies because in addition to taste, there is variability in the texture, pliability, shape, color, and number and type of chips. Each of these cookie traits, contribute to quality, unlike some other foods in which taste is the only factor in quality. Because of these variables of quality and personal preference, students will be able to evaluate and engineer a cookie based on a number of cookie traits beyond just taste. If an oven is not available, alternatively, pudding can be used as the central focus for this unit because of its similar evaluative qualities.