Try Out New Foods with a Taste Test

I was on Pinterest recently and saw a post about doing a family fun night activity involving taste testing different flavors of Oreos. There are so many different ones now, and this particular activity, from Joy in the Works, involved buying different flavors and doing a blind tasting where people tried to guess which flavor they were sampling.

But it occurred to me that this could actually be an educational activity as well.

Whether you are tasting cookies, different colors of watermelon (that one is from Go Science Girls) or different varieties of apples (1 Plus 1 Plus 1 Equals 1), tasting foods and describing the taste is a great way to learn about our sense of taste, the words we use to describe taste, and to expand vocabulary and description of tastes.

Ask children to come up with different words to describe what they are tasting: crunchy, chewy, soft, tangy, sweet and so on. And remember that smell and sight are important in how we perceive taste, so describing those things is great, too.

Do you ever use taste tests as a way to learn? I’d love to hear about it!

[Photo via Go Science Girls.]

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Watermelon Activities for Kids

The celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe is important throughout Mexico and other parts of the world. Her feast day is Dec. 12, and the celebrations honoring her appearance to Juan Diego in 1531 begin a few days before that.

Whether you celebrate yourself or just want to share about the celebration at home or in your classroom, Las Mañanitas: The Beautiful Celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe is a good place to start. The book, by Ernesto Joel Vega Rosales and Jeanette Gonzalez Seneviratne, with illustrations by Dana Sanmar, tells the story of a family’s celebration of the feast day in both English and Spanish.

They prepare with a novena, which is nine days of prayers and preparations. The children, Lucia and Pablo, are given special outfits made by their grandmother that look like what Juan Diego might have worn when he saw Our Lady. The book describes the prayers that are made each day, such as a prayer for respect for life, for families and for the indigenous people of the Americas, to name a few.

As told in the book, Juan Diego was a native Mexican born near modern day Mexico City. His given name was Cuaauhtlatoatzin, which means “He who speaks like an eagle.” When he converted to Christianity his name was changed to Juan Diego, and as he walked to church he passed a hill called Tepeyac. One day he heard the birds singing especially beautifully and a voice called him to go to the top of the hill.

There he saw Our Lady of Guadalupe, who asked him to tell the bishop she wanted a chapel built in her name at the foot of the hill. The bishop asked for a sign that Juan Diego really saw her, and later she had him collect flowers that she blessed and take them to the bishop. When Juan Diego dropped the flowers, an image of Our Lady could be seen on his cloak, which is still on display in her basilica to this day.

The feast day is celebrated as mañanitas, which includes singing, indigenous music and dancing, and children presenting flowers to Our Lady. Juan Diego is remembered today as being humble, brave and faithful, and was the first indigenous American made a saint.

The book is colorful and tells the story in a clear way, and it’s fun to have it both in English and Spanish if you teach Spanish or speak Spanish at home or in the classroom. It’s a great way to learn the basics of the celebration and the story of Juan Diego and why he is still remembered today.

About the book: 40 pages, paperback, published 2024 by Loyola Press. Suggested retail price $14.99.

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Have you read?

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