In this section, Dr. Rebusco explains how she turned her idea to combine language learning and cooking into a practical, interactive, and fun course for MIT students.
Idea for the Course
"I like to eat and cook, and I like to learn different languages. And I thought maybe I can combine the two things."
Dr. Rebusco discusses how she came up with the idea for this unique course.
Goals of the Course
"I thought that this course could help [the students] learn how to cook and how to recognize what’s healthy from what’s not so healthy."
Dr. Rebusco talks about her teaching goals and what she hoped her students would learn at the end of the course.
Preparing for the Course
"I was trying to find cultural or grammatical topics that would relate to the dish that we were cooking."
The instructor explains the ways in which she prepared for each class session.
Dr. Rebusco purchased the ingredients for the dishes at the local Shaw’s Supermarket, Whole Foods, and Sessa’s Cold Cuts and Italian Specialties in Somerville, MA.
Creating the Cooking Assignments
"The idea of the kitchen assignment is the same idea behind a written assignment…You want to reinforce what has been learned before."
Dr. Rebusco explains the weekly cooking assignments the students were asked to do
outside of class.
Written and Oral Assignments
Students were required to complete the following activities each week:
- Read from the instructor’s blog entry for that week.
- Complete the exercises and assignments for each lesson.
- Cook a dish on their own and bring it to class
- Students purchased their own ingredients
- In class, everyone tasted each dish and discussed how it turned out and what could have been done differently.
