A new venture at the Martin C. Barell school program is Classroom 4’s Salad Shoppe. They’ve been planning it for quite some time, matching “salad prep/business” skills to IEP goals, and finally three weeks ago they opened the salad delivery service up to a small group of customers – administrative staff and the finance department. And now this week, after many positive reviews and success with the salad team in the classroom, they are opening the service up to all staff and this week they expect over 20 salad orders!
On Tuesday of each week, staff members get an order form in their mailbox that students have copied and stapled. Customers get to choose type of salad, mix-ins and different dressings. On Wednesday, once the salad team has taken inventory of what is needed to fill the orders, they go shopping for all the components. The students keep track of the money and budget so they can make all the necessary purchases.
Thursday mornings are busy with food prep – cleaning, chopping, peeling, measuring, etc.
Then it’s time to assemble and everyone pitches in. Based on their IEP goals, each student has a different job to do – whether it’s labeling, measuring, counting, assembling, etc. At the same time that they’re making lunches, the students are also learning new vocabulary, following multi-step directions, learning to recognize fresh vs. rotten or expired foods and more.
Kitchen safety is a priority and the students use a Slapchop tool to keep fingers away from sharp knives.
Once all the salads are made, labeled and matched with the appropriate on-the-side dressings, it’s time for delivery. All the containers go into a shopping cart and the team travels around the building doing personal deliveries of staff salads. It’s always a pleasure to see them arrive at your door!
The Salad Shoppe has its own Instagram page where you can follow their salad adventures from week to week – we hope you will follow them!
See you on Thursday!