19 - Learn to Change: How to make prawncrackers (PSE)
[We have been looking at examples of PSE. We read a story of 'The Good Page', a play about Aesop - the famous strotyteller and a case of The stolen Smell. These are simple stories, written in Plain and Simple English, and simple to read -- aloud. We can test our English speaking ability by retelling these stories to our family and friends -- in English if it is a Monday.]
Now, we will limit ourselves to a small world. A small world has a few objects and a few interactions or events. We can talk about a small world in a few words and a few sentences. For examples: arithmatics is a small world [see 8 - Counting, Numbers and Arithmatics (PSE) http://www.gotoknow.org/blogs/posts/470329] - we can talk about arithmatics using numbers (objects), operations (+ plus, - minus, x time, / divide and () brackets) and simple concepts of computing and equality; Q&A is another small world though there are many millions of questions and many millions more of answers. But we can see there are only a few patterns for questions and only a few patterns for answers. When we replace a word at a certain place or position in a question by another word, we get another different question. We can repeat replacing words by some other words.
[For examples (of small changes in a small world):
'May I have some water?' - replace 'water' by 'food'
'May I have some food?' - replace 'I' by 'my dog'
'May my dog have some food?' - replace 'May' by 'Could'
'Could my dog have some food?'
-- We can keep on like we play a game ;-)
-- Can we see a pattern?
-- Can we pick a good sentence from a book and replace a word or two to make other good sentences? ]
The small world for us this time is the world of people who make prawncrackers (ข้าวเกรียบกุ้ง). What would we see if we visit a prawncracker maker when s/he is making prawncrackers? We would see some prawns, some tapioca / cassava flour (แป้งมัน), some salt, and some (secret) spices. We would see some utensils and equipment like an electric blender or a set of mortar and pestle, large pots, steamers, linen cloths, knives, cutting boards, stoves, and bamboo trays for drying pieces of yet-to-fry prawncrackers.
Prawncrackers are made like this:
finely mince some peeled prawns;
mix the minced prawns with tapioca flour and little water;
fold over and knead several times to mix them well;
roll the mix into a round stick about 1 inch thick;
cut into lengths of 5-6 inches;
wrap each cut sticks with a clean linen cloth;
put the wrapped up sticks in a steamer; close the lid;
steam the sticks for 15 minutes or until cooked;
unwrap the sticks into a drying tray; leave to cool;
cut the sticks into thin slices;
put the slices on drying trays and dry them in the sun;
turn them over to dry both sides of each slice.
The process to make prawncrackers is not difficult but is quite long. After quick frying in hot oil, they often got eaten very quickly too.
Source: This prawncracker recipe comes by word-of-mouth. The exact amounts of ingredients may vary to taste. The process may vary from one maker to another.
Exercises:
1) Read the story again aloud, then retell your buddies how to make prawncrackers or try to make some for yourself and your buddies.
2) Replace prawns by fish or chicken and tell your buddies how to make fishcrackers or chickencrackers.
3) Rice noodles are made from rice flour and a little tapioca flour in a similar process. Can you tell your buddies how to make rice noodles yourselves?
[Dear Teachers:
The theme and key concept for this session of PSE is that of 'learn to change'. We learn from examples, we follow what we have learned, then we make a small change. From there we can learn to change a little more here and there. Each time we make a change we make a small change so that we still follow 'the pattern'. Nature uses the strategy of making small changes and testing each change for fitness. Nature has been using this process for many millions of years. Charles Darwin called this process 'Evolution'. We can learn a great deal by following this process. (Yes, this a 21st C process and beyond. It is timeless.) ]
