Sunday, March 21, 2010

Mustache

Have you ever noticed that bakers and chefs are often depicted with mustaches?

I don't think I ever really gave it much thought until my kindergarten students began investigating the topic.

From their immersion in both fiction and nonfiction texts they concluded that a mustache is part of the uniform.

Chef hat, apron, mustache...

Then I began to realize that they were right. The chefs in Disney movies (The Little Mermaid, Lady and the Tramp) have mustaches, Chef Boyardee has a mustache, bakers in children's books have mustaches, even our own Kindergarten Cafe chef sports a rather large mustache.

When they came to this realization they were already deep into their play in our classroom bakery (renamed "The Cakery" by popular vote) and without the mustaches it seemed as though something was missing.

We wondered how to find those little plastic clip-on mustaches or should we simply let the kids draw them on somehow? The dilemma was solved at the $1 store quite by accident.

There I was standing in line with my hands full of gift wrap and tissue paper when to my left I spotted a gumball machine brimming with mustaches in a variety of styles and colors! Each with a self adhesive backing good for hours of enjoyment.

I drove home, collected a bunch of quarters and headed back to the store so excited I could burst. I couldn't wait to share them with the kids and when they saw them the next day their reaction was fantastic.

Some even got creative.
We are having a bake sale on Friday and I am looking forward to seeing mustached bakers busily helping customers and serving up tasty delights.

Be our guest!

9 comments:

WAT said...

Yeah, it's true. Chefs need to get rid of those mustaches though. What if one of those hairs falls into the food? HA! Even that muppet chef had one.

Barbara said...

You are so resourceful! I can just see you excitedly stuffing the machine with quarters. Are your kids baking the items for the bake sale?

Can the girls wear mustaches too or they relegated to being little waitresses with tiny aprons? :)

Gary said...

Wat - Oh, how I have missed you on FYB! Mustaches are everywhere. It is an interesting image. One would think they would not want facial hair to catch the crumbs from all the baked goods they must eat. Go figure.

Barbara - Interesting point. That gumball machine that was labelled "mustaches" actually had a few moles throw in the mix. I was not thrilled to pay 50 cents for a mole but 'ya get what ya get' (the false advertising really annoyed me). It turned out to be a good thing though because some of the girls preferred the moles (or beauty marks) to the mustaches and it gave them all a choice. I do have some wonderful pictures of girls in chef hats with mustaches and earrings. So cute!

We did make bread from scratch in the classroom (it was delicious, much to our surprise) but the items from the bake sale are being donated by the students' parents. Some will be homemade while others prefer store bought items. I am looking forward to it. We are also making a Bakery ABC book that I hope to share on the blog. Very clever how the kids thought of ways to make the letters.

Tess Kincaid said...

One of my favorite pictures of my daughter in grade school is of her in a paper chef's hat. No mustache, though!

lacochran said...

Magnifique! I guess it's true--even Ratatouille had whiskers.

Unknown said...

take more pictures of the bakery its' so cute, I love the idea, we are not allowed to have bake sales at our school anymore sad
allergies etc...'
hope you have fun and make money for a good cause maybe next dramatic play can be pizzeria, I am doing it in May. My son is to start kindergarten in sept. I visited 6 schools none have a dramatic play area that they even use much, so sad, do you use a sensory table too?
enjoy

Barbara said...

Good luck with the bake sale.
What will you use the money for?
More mustaches?..hehehee!
Happy Spring...has it come to the city yet?

Gary said...

Barbara - The bake sale greatly surpassed our expectations. We thought we would raise $20 or perhaps $30 tops. When we counted it up we were shocked that it was a little over $102! We are not sure what we are doing with the money at this point. The plan was to discuss it with the class after we knew how much we raised but we did have a presale discussion that went like this.

Student #1: I think we should give it to those people who don't have homes.
Teacher: I think that is a fantastic idea.
Student #2: I think we should go to the zoo.
Student #1: Oh yeah. That's what I meant to say. Let's go to the zoo.

So much for the homeless. Although now that it is a nice chunk of change I think Lauren and I will direct them towards charity. The zoo is free anyway.

Whisper - We took lots of pictures and reviewing them it becomes evident of all the small moments I was unable to take in at the time. Students assuming their roles/jobs helping customers, their confidence, their patience, their adorablability (is that even a word?). I was stunned with how smoothly it all went. I am also glad that I now have 7 days to recover. Too bad about the lack of dramatic play in kindergarten. It is so important. I am not sure what a sensory table is so we probably don't have one. We do have a light table though.

Lacochran - Funny you mentioned Ratatouille because I looked up the chefs in that movie and they didn't have mustaches. I neglected to think in broader terms and missed the whisker connection completely. Thanks for mentioning it. Very clever.

Willow - How about a well placed mole? Some of the girls seem to prefer those but I love the girls who slap on a mustache with the rest of 'em. Kids are amazing.

lettuce said...

ha thats so funny

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