Presentation of the Didactic Unit on “Aceite del Bajo Aragón”
The assembly hall of Damián Forment Secondary School in Alcorisa, will be the setting for the public presentation of a project that is absolutely innovative in Spain.
(20/04/2006)
Over two years’ work has been carried out by the team coordinated by Olga Valientes and Joaquina Melero to finally establish this Didactic Unit on Olive Oil from Southern Aragon. Over this period, the two Aragonese teachers have held workshops, carried out visits and given shape to what has now become four school books.
These are two teacher’s books, one for primary and one for secondary, and two student’s workbooks that complement them.
Through this workshop, students discover the interesting world of oil. It is proposed that oil should be processed in the traditional, organic manner, seeking an alternative to the highly pollutant vegetable wastewater. The different oil types and qualities are also distinguished in these texts, through simple tasting processes; students are taught to understand the meaning of the information that appears on labels and back labels (the distinctive label on foods with Designation of Origin) and, in short, to be responsible consumers.
A visit to an Almazara or olive oil mill is essential to obtain first-hand knowledge of all the processes that take place during oil processing by the continuous method. For this reason, one of the activities proposed is a series of visits to the processing plants in the area. During these visits, the students learn very simple ways of detecting and identifying in the laboratory some of the most important characteristics of oil, such as acidity, whether or not the oil is refined, and they discover the different techniques for “killing” olives, making soap with used domestic oil and a great deal more.
One of the major objectives of this workshop is to make students aware of how important the role of olive oil is in the Mediterranean diet and how consuming this oil benefits our health, the wealth it lends to our cuisine and it also enables them to discover, prepare and taste some olive by-products such as olive pâtés, sauces, different olive dressings, seasonings made from aromatic oils, etc.
The message the teachers want to transmit to the students is “We hope that, as well as learning, you enjoy and savour this workshop”.The authors are two Aragonese Secondary Teachers, with Chemistry Degrees: Joaquina Melero and Olga Valiente and the workshop presented has arisen from their teaching experience and a shared interest in teaching practical, useful contents that are related with the area in which they practise their profession, Southern Aragon.
They met at “Pablo Serrano” Secondary School, Andorra (Teruel) in the Department of Physics and Chemistry, where they were both teaching, in 1995. They shared an interest in applying practical methodologies and teaching contents that bear a relation to local day-to-day life.
In November of 2002 they published their first work: “Taller de alimentación y consumo” (Food and consumer workshop) published by the Department of Health, Consumer Affairs and Social Services of the Regional Government of Aragon and was sent to all secondary schools in Aragon, free of charge.
This new publication was made possible thanks to the joint collaboration of the Designation of Origin “Aceite del Bajo Aragón” Regulatory Council and the three leaders in the area, ADIBAMA (Asociación para el Desarrollo Integral del Bajo Martín), CEDEMAR (Centro para el Desarrollo de la Comarca del Mar de Aragón) and OMEZYMA (Organización para el Desarrollo del Mezquín, Matarraña y Bajo Aragón), which displayed their interest from the start in disseminating the culture and quality of olive oil from Southern Aragón among the educational community, and decided that to lend their support to this project could be a good means of achieving this aim.
The spirit of the school curriculum in Aragon aims at students becoming familiar with their environment and discovering the wealth of the Aragonese Region. For this reason, what could be better than working on and studying a topic that is so deep-rooted in our land of Southern Aragon, in our area and in the family setting as the cultivation of the olive tree, the processing of olive oil and spreading this tradition to the other Aragonese areas.
© Designation of Origin “ACEITE DEL BAJO ARAGÓN”
Regulatory Council of Designation of Origin.