I expect to see a pig flying past my window any minute now.
Ed Balls has managed to get something right for once. Well, sort of, anyway.
This is an excellent suggestion. Being able to cook is an essential life skill. What are you supposed to eat if you can’t cook a basic meal? Expensive, unhealthy, foul ready-meals are really the only option beyond beans on toast - neither of which are the foundation for a healthy diet. Or, indeed, a healthy wallet.
Now, I think the emphasis is wrong. Balls wants to introduce compulsory lessons in 8 healthy dishes to combat obesity. This strikes me as a poor way to approach the matter. What use is teaching children to cook certain, specific dishes if they don’t understand the fundamental mechanics of cookery? The preparation of food is generally based in a number of universal, essential techniques. Surely it would be better to teach teenagers these techniques rather than specific meals? That would allow them to cook any number of meals, and give them a degree of choice in what they ate.
So, the measure is very much half-arsed. But it’s a step in the right direction. Cooking is as essential a skill as basic mathematics, and should be taught as much as it.
There is something to be said for understanding the importance of cooking. It is one of life’s most important skills and deserves the attention of educational establishments.
In that regard, it is good to see the Times article highlight the 15% of schools that do not offer any food education. These (”mainly all-boys schools”) are going to be compelled to provide kitchens by 2011. There is an uphill struggle here, though. I remember a tour of an independent school aged 11, where a parent asked if there were educational kitchens. She was told “This is a boys’ school”. Needless to say, that kind of attitude rather put me off that particular institution.
As a nice liberal, though, I do fear government telling us what we should eat. Shouldn’t our nice rational teenagers go home and figure it out for themselves? In the free market of cooking, individualism must surely prosper
“As a nice liberal, though, I do fear government telling us what we should eat.”
Hmm. That logic could be extended to other subjects, equally. “As a nice liberal, I do fear the government telling us what we should do to solve equations…”
However, I agree up to a point, as I say in the post. In terms of efficiency alone, it would be better to teach techniques rather than meals, for the reasons expressed above.
“Shouldn’t our nice rational teenagers go home and figure it out for themselves?”
I assume this comment is at least partially tongue in cheeck. If it’s not, then I’d point out that education is surely about providing people with the knowledge to be rational.
“In the free market of cooking, individualism must surely prosper”
I’m certain this is tongue-in-cheek. However, since I suspect the point has, laughably, been made elsewhere, I’d point out that the free-market of cooking can’t function if people don’t know how to cook.