On Wednesday, 9th March Class 3 had a choc-tastic time in York! The day began with a beautiful walk around the city walls from Bootham Bar to Monk Bar. Along the way, we passed stunning views of York Minster and Robin Hood Tower, which is a Victorian replacement for a ruined medieval tower. It has a carving of crossed keys set into its paving to remind us that it is close to the Minster. We also passed some of the modern buildings of the University of York St. John. We could also see views of the Rowntree's sweet factory, almost a kilometre away.
We had a great idea to take an extended break while walking along the walls, as it was such a sunny, warm day, to have lunch with a view, so we made a picnic area at the top of one of the towers! After our walk, it was time for our tour of the chocolate factory.
We zoomed up the chocolate lift to begin the tour. That's where we met our tour guide, Joe. He told us so many interesting facts such as, there are 250 different types/flavours of Kit Kat in the world! Throughout the tour, we learnt about where chocolate first began, with the Maya and Aztec civilisations, how chocolate was founded in York and the history and development of chocolate over the years, in York, learning about Terry's, Rowntree and Craven's family chocolate businesses. Later during the tour, we learnt about the process of cocoa bean to bar and we even tasted cacao in its most raw form. This was not to everyone's taste! We made our own chocolate lollies, with various delicious toppings, which tasted much better than the cacao nibs we had just tried. Finally, our tour ended with a fabulous demonstration, by the chocolatier, showing us how beautiful trays of chocolate truffles are made. It was a wonderful day!
As part of our Maya topic we have been completing some Mayan weaving. We have learned about the history of the weaving and how dyes are made using natural products such as banana leaves. The children concentrated hard to focus on their weaving, as you can see from the photos in the gallery.
