Engaging with the science behind food

Suitable for 14-19-year olds (secondary and high schools, and college), this article and accompanying activity sheet can be used in the classroom, STEM clubs and at home.

This resource links to KS4 and KS5 food technology, biology and chemistry.

It can also be used as a careers resource and links to Gatsby Benchmarks:
Gatsby Benchmark 2: Learning from career and labour market information
Gatsby Benchmark 4: Linking curriculum learning to careers

• This teaching resource explains the work of Dr Salam A Ibrahim, a food microbiologist at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical University. He has established the Food Microbiology and Biotechnology Lab, where researchers and students collaborate with food industry professionals to address real-world challenges in food production and safety.

• This resource also contains interviews with members of the lab and offers an insight into careers in food microbiology. If your students have questions for the team, they can send them to them online. All they need to do is to go to the article online (see the Futurum link below), scroll down to the end and type in the question(s). The team will reply!

• The activity sheet provides ‘talking points’ (based on Bloom’s Taxonomy) to prompt students to reflect on Dr Ibrahim’s research and challenges them to use microorganisms to create their own food.

This resource was first published on Futurum Careers, a free online resource and magazine aimed at encouraging 14-19-year-olds worldwide to pursue careers in science, tech, engineering, maths, medicine (STEM) and social sciences, humanities and the arts for people and the economy (SHAPE).

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