Science of Food Safety: Grades 9-12
Tue, May 22, 2012 2:57 AM
Science of Food Safety
This is a review of the Sci Guide Science of Food Safety
This Sci Guide is broken down into four topics. 1 Understanding Bacteria, 2 Farm, 3 Processing and Transportation, 4 Retail and Home and 5 Outbreak and Future Technology. The flow of this Sci Guide takes you on the same journey your food goes on starting from the farm and ending on your plate.
Bacteria is one of the leading causes of foodborne illnesses. It can be found everywhere and can spread extremely fast. In this part of the Sci Guide you have websites that help you classify various types of bacteria, information on the safe handling of food, and how the government responds to a report of contaminated food. My favorite website is a website http://www.extension.iastate.edu/foodsafety takes you through 4 lesson plans that give you tons of information about food safety. I especially like the acronym F.A.T.T.O.M. which explains the various factors that allow foodborne pathogens to grow: Food, Acidity, Time, Temperature, Oxygen, and Moisture.
Food that contains harmful substances and / or pathogenic microorganisms can cause food borne illness. The section titled farm takes you to a list of websites that explain the various organizations associated with the government such as the USDA, FDA and the CDC. This section clarifies the various government departments associated with protecting us getting sick from our food.
Food is cleaned and packaged before it’s shipped to various locations around the world. The section on processing and transportation takes you to various websites that explain the different ways food products can be treated to protect you from bacteria. Irradiation, pasteurization and UHP are highlighted in this section.
Once food is in our care we need to educate ourselves on the steps we need to take to protect ourselves from foodborne illness. In the section called retail and home we take the responsibility of protecting ourselves from bacteria using the 4 C’s of food safety, chilling, cooking, cleaning, and combating cross contamination. In this section you will find helpful websites, lessons, and activities to educate yourself and your students on the 4 C’s.
Even though our food system is as clean as it ever was. We need to protect ourselves from new pathogens and bacterial resistance to our methods of treatment. In the section titled outbreak and future technology we learn how epidemiologists can use molecular technology to trace the source of a foodborne illness outbreak.
This Sci Guide provides more than enough material and information to make a robust unit on food safety. You have many angles and ways to use this Sci guide to teach food safety along with any biological topic you cover. If you’re teaching ecology you can tie that in to the farming section. If you’re studying DNA you can relate that to the way scientist use DNA finger printing to find patterns and points of origin.