Gail Hall presented this great (and very tasty!) lesson at this fall's Geofest. It was warmly received by the participants in her workshop. We thought we should share this we our loyal readers. The objective of the lesson is to teach students about the main physical features of New York State. Of course, the cookies can be decorated any way you wish. So, human features (like highways or the Erie Canal) can be placed on the cookies as well.

Step 1: Prepare enough cookies (see recipe on the left) so that the students can be put into groups of three.

Step 2: Before receiving a cookie, groups should decide which students will be responsible for adding each geographic feature.

Step 3: Distribute cookies and the materials needed to decorate them.

Step 4: use the following guidelines

• Remember to have students frost their cookies first.
• Use chocolate chips for the Adirondack and Catskill Mountains.
• Use blue frosting for all rivers, lakes and coastlines.
• Use red candy heats for the cities.
• Sprinkle yellow sugar crystals for the Allegheny and Tug Hill Plateaus.
• Sprinkle green sugar crystals for the coastal plains near the Great Lakes and Long Island.
• Give our capital city, Albany, its own color.

Step 5: When finished, students can share their creations and quiz each other as to the geographical features they added. It is sometimes fun for the students to show their cookies to the principal and take photographs of their creations for the school newsletter.