Edible Science Model Projects: Part 5--Cell Cakes Project, Year #2

Last year, we did a Cell Cake Project in the grand tradition of edible science model-making!  It was a tremendous success, and it remains the most popular post on my blog by far!

This year's newest member of the project;  The Bacterial Cell

This year is the second year of the project, and I decided to make it meatier (or cakier, or whatever) by adding a research and presentation component to it, as well as adding critical thinking to the project by adding different cell types and asking students to compare and contrast them.

"Remember, the primary goal of this project is to describe the similarities and differences between animal, plant and bacterial cells. "

-Mrs. Kaplan

This year's Plant Cell

• A descriptive list of the required elements of the Cell Cake Project
• The super-easy and yummy Marshmallow Fondant recipe that kids can use for labeling and other structures.
• Venn diagram organizer for plant, bacterial and animal cells

The Animal Cell--this cake was saved from a crumbly death by a large batch of delicious homemade fondant icing.

Cell Anatomy Resources:

• RESEARCH FORM: http://www.iecc.edu/wvc/lrc/resrws.pdf
• http://www.johnkyrk.com/CellIndex.html--this site has several links in the drop-down menu that could be useful in identifying additional structures or more detailed explanations that would be helpful in making your poster/model.  For example http://www.johnkyrk.com/golgiAlone.html has detailed descriptions of how the Golgi body works.  
• http://www.cellsalive.com/cells/3dcell.htm  has interactive models of all three cell types.
• Interactive diagram of a bacterial cell: http://www.neok12.com/diagram/Microorganisms-01.htm
• Bacterial cell:http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/cells/bacteriacell.html

• Animal cell: http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/cells/animalcell.html
• Plant cell: http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/cells/plantcell.html
• Inside the Cell PDF booklet (full color illustrations): http://publications.nigms.nih.gov/insidethecell/pdf/inside_the_cell.pdf
• **Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_(biology)--this site can be used as a STARTING PLACE to find information.  Keep in mind, that Wikipedia has gathered it's information from other places...those places are listed (with links) at the bottom of the page.  Those are the links that should be used in your research forms, NOT "en.wikipedia.org".

• http://cellimagelibrary.org/

Edible Science Model Projects: Part 5--Cell Cakes Project, Year #2

Edible Science Model Projects: Part 3--The Periodic Table of Cupcakes!

Our success with the Cell Cakes in 6th year science inspired our 7th years to create the Periodic Table of the Cupcakes which will be occurring next week on Wednesday.  Maybe I'll ask Daria Musk to join us in a hangout of the creation!?   That would be really fun.  I will post photos and a student-edited video when we are done.

Instead of using icing for the writing, we are going to use edible cake pens (found here) and we are making our own Marshmallow Fondant.  Why the extra work?  The pre-made fondant that you can purchase tastes not-great, and by all accounts this easy recipe makes delectable fondant that you actually enjoy eating, instead of peeling it off the cake (like an orange rind) and then eating it.

Why fondant?  Because then we can pre-make the atomic symbol:  we can write out the symbol and the atomic number (and mass if we have the space) and then form an assembly line of sorts to put it all together. Theoretically.  We'll see.

Anyway, here's the YouTube video that inspired us and the Huffington Post article that describes the video.

Edible Science Model Projects: Part 3--The Periodic Table of Cupcakes!