Kids Cuisine

When I was in middle school, students were required to take one quarter (roughly 9 weeks) of Home Ec. If you took it in 7th grade, you learned to sew. If you took it in 8th, you learned to cook. I was lucky enough to take Home Ec during 8th grade, though “learning to cook” may be a bit of an exaggeration. In our 9 weeks, we learned how to make omelettes, cake from a mix, and a few dinner items. The only skill of any particular worth was the omelette making, which I still practice often today.

To be honest, I’m not sure why Home Ec was still part of the mandatory curriculum — I guess it was a throwback to decades past. In the spirit of the ’90s, the classes weren’t separated by gender; both boys and girls took Home Ec and Tech Ed (I guess what you might have called “Shop Class”).

So far as I can tell, cooking classes have almost entirely vanished from US schools. While there are a few schools in my area that offer a preculinary vocational program, most have no cooking at all. Certainly, cooking is not part of classes needed for graduation.

The situation has been the same in the UK, but that is about to change. Researchers and policy makers in Britain have concluded that knowing how to cook healthy food is an important skill for young adults, especially for combating obesity. According to the BBC, all students will have to take cookery courses by 2011. The delay in implementation will give schools time to find or train cooking teachers and gather needed equipment (including new classrooms in many cases).

Students will bring cooking ingredients in from home, the idea being that kids would get involved in buying groceries. The school system is working on funding to subsidize ingredient purchases for low-income students.

This new program seems like a good idea, both for the UK and the US. But the emphasis on standardized testing and core subjects across America may make this kind of education impossible to implement. What do you think? Would you like to see cooking back in the classroom?