I am so glad that I picked learning how to bake rolls and bread for my learning topic this semester. I have so many family and friends who are naturals at this, and it has never come easy for me. Now, I feel so much more confident and am not afraid to try a new recipe. I also learned something valuable this week - it's ok to make a mistake. You just have to keep trying so you can figure out what went wrong. I was telling my mom on the phone about how well some of my baking as of late has turned out and she just started laughing. She made some cinnamon rolls last weekend, and they completely flopped! She still hasn't quite figured out what went wrong (she did use wheat flour instead of white - but she has done this before with success too). I told her it made me feel better because as I keep trying different typed of breads, I am sure I will not always have success, and that is ok!
I started off this learning experience by doing something I felt comfortable with, making banana bread. The yeast breads were scary to me because they had always been troublesome, so starting off with something easier was a good starting point for me. Because I had prior knowledge, I was able to rely on my long-term memory and make something successfully. I also made a small mistake (not greasing my loaf pan properly). I think this ended up being a good thing, because sometimes we learn more from our mistakes than from our successes.
Over the next few weeks, I did a lot of research and reading to help me understand yeast breads and this helped quite a bit when I was able to actually put into practice the things I was learning. Some of the things I read helped me figure out where I could have been making mistakes with the yeast before (not using the right kind of yeast, not letting it proof long enough, not letting the dough rise enough, etc.) With the amount of required reading I was doing for coursework, I was surprised I didn't find this extra reading to be tedious. I was intrinsically motivated because I really wanted to understand where I had been falling short so I could fix my mistakes.
When I finally got some practice baking bread, I was able to apply some of the knowledge I had gained from the reading. When my mom told me to add a little sugar to the yeast, I knew it was to help the yeast grow faster and fuller. When my sister said we needed to add some of the flour and other ingredients to the yeast mixture before the salt, I knew it was because the salt could kill the yeast if it came into direct contact.
Learning about the Zone of Proximal Development was really interesting because I could see it happening throughout the process. I started out with something I could not on my own, but through the help and guidance of my mom, I was able to practice and learn and even have success on my own. It was extremely helpful for me to be able to work with my mom. There were so may things that I learned by watching and helping and being involved with her, that I would not have learned by just reading a recipe or having her tell me how to do it over the phone. I knew what the dough should feel and look like, and I knew what the yeast looked like when it was ready. I could see that my mother has a real automaticity for baking breads. It comes so naturally to her, and I am starting to see that I can develop this too.
This week it has been really interesting to think about this process and about what I have learned and been thinking over the past several weeks (metacognition). It has really helped me to understand the principles we have been learning about because I have been trying to find a way to relate them to what I am doing in real life. Throughout this process, I certainly have not become an expert and still think of myself very much as a novice. However, I do feel that if I keep practicing, I might get there one day!
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