Combine eight common ingredients, the desire to serve up food science in a new and tasty way, and a large serving of creativity and you have The Pizza Explorer, an interactive CD-ROM produced by the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) with Purdue University.
Developed with the goal of teaching interested students the basics of food science and food chemistry, The Pizza Explorer is an entertaining approach to education. The program allows middle school and high school students to learn about food chemistry, food processing, and nutrition through topics that include the history of pizza, the nutritional makeup of its ingredients, and food processing, with games and quizzes added to spice up the mix.
As The Pizza Explorer developer Bruce Watkins, Ph.D., professor of food science at Purdue University, points out, “How else can you disguise a food chemistry CD-ROM? All kids in this country eat pizza and relate to pizza as a food.” Use of this creative combination of a universally loved food and the computer allows educators to serve up a very appealing teaching tool.
The Pizza Explorer is available online at the National Health Museum’s Web site, www.accessexcellence.org. The CD-ROM, which contains voice-over narration and additional information, is available free to science teachers; call IFT at 312-782-8424.
