Get Your Pretzels Here!

Activity Overview

Milestone Week has brought a fun and challenging cooking experience: pretzel-making! This activity works on building our sensorimotor system through the actions of mixing and kneading and exposure to new and varied textures. It’s also a great opportunity to work the fine motor muscles in our hands. This activity also centers around a more concrete exploration of the scientific method. By framing this activity with attention to hypothesis through prediction, observation, and making conclusions, we have the opportunity to deeply witness the behavior of a material after it has undergone a change. Happy baking!

What You Need

• Pretzel Recipe and Ingredients

• Kitchen Supplies: baking sheet, mixing bowl, mixing spoon

• Silicone baking mats or parchment paper- if you use parchment paper, spray or rub with cooking oil or butter.

Steps

1. Go through the recipe with your student and have them help get the kitchen work area set up.

2. Follow the instructions to make the dough.

3. Pause before the baking soda bath step as it is an opportunity to talk with your student about scientific predictions. What will happen to the pretzels in the bath? If your student is able to write or make representational drawings, have them write or draw their predictions.

4. Once the pretzels are out of the bath, have the children observe the differences between the ones that are not going in the oven.

5. Once the pretzels are out of the oven, add pretzel salt, or kosher salt to the top and notice the differences in how they feel, smell, taste, sound, and look!

6. If your student is able to write or make representational drawings, have them write or draw about the experience, what they liked, noticed and learned through the experience.

Guiding Questions

• How does the dough feel? Sticky, smooth, wet, squishy?

• How can we stretch the dough?

• What do you notice about the pretzels when they come out of the bath? Do they look different? The same? Bigger? Smaller?

Extensions

• Use the dough to make shapes, letters and numbers before baking.

• Make dipping sauces for your pretzels, or try different condiments with your pretzel and see what you like the best! Hot sauce? Butter? Mustard? Ketchup? The options are endless.