Eating together

Objectives:
• Understanding cultural diversity in food associated with festivals.
• To understand the different kinds of food and food related festivals in other states.
Group discussion: The first stage of the project could be a discussion with the children on the different kinds of foods and festivals related to food. This discussion would reveal their prior knowledge. The discussion could revolve around the types of food, timing of intake, types of festivals, rituals involved in each festivals, time of festivals, special food prepared for festivals etc.
This discussion would help students prepare themselves for their interaction with the students from other states. Students can be split in groups and each group can be asked to write about a particular festival of their locality.

Letter Writing: Students can be encouraged to write letters to students from other states on festivals they celebrate locally. The letter needs to include a self-introduction, a short description about themselves, their place of residence and a few interesting facts about the place followed by a short write-up about the festival of their interest. While concluding, students can ask specific questions they would like to know about festivals in other states. Below mentioned are some indicative questions to aid the discussion in the classroom. Teachers need to encourage students to develop and write their own questions.

Knowing about your food.
1. Name some of the food items in your state?
Which among those are your staple food?
2. Which food item do you like the most?
3. How is the food cooked in you place?
4. What are the food crops commonly grown in your state?
5. Have you eat south Indian foods? What are some south India food items you have eaten?
6. When do you eat together? Do you like to eat together?

About meal at school.
1. What are the meal timings in your school?
2. Does the school provide you with food or do you bring food from home?
3. What are different items that are served in the meal?
4. Who serves the food?
5. Does your teacher eat with you?

Festivals at you place:
1. What are the festivals celebrated in your state?
2. How are these festivals celebrated?
3. Are there food related festivals celebrated in your state? If yes, can you tell me something about it?
4. What are some of the special dishes that are cooked during festivals? How are they cooked?
5. How do you like festivals at you place? As the students engage in the discussion, they would come up with many more interesting
questions. Encourage children to think out of the box. Organizing a community lunch in school:

Ask the children to prepare some food and get it in school and arrange community lunch. They should be aware of the name of the food item, its ingredients and method of preparation.

Outcome possibilities:
1. Posters depicting:
a. Different kinds of food items and their ingredients.
b. One festival/ many festivals
2. Collecting pictures and making an album of:
a. Different kinds of foods
b. Different kinds of festival in our state and other states in India.