KORC - Kinabatangan Orang-utan Rescue Centre

Animal mantles have proved very popular. Becoming a rescue centre lends itself well to creating tensions and dilemmas.

Collaborative work, planning where to put the new feeding platforms without disturbing the existing habitats and avoiding the pygmy elephant routes.

During one spring term, my 5/4 class became K.O.R.C. This was a registered charity based in Malaysian Borneo on the Kinabatangan River, which specialises in the rescue and rehabilitation of sick and injured orang-utans. K.O.R.C had been founded by Anna Caley six years previously and she had gathered many voluntary workers since. A team of newly qualified scientists arrived*, to conduct some research on the rehabilitation of the orang-utans. This has been an exciting event for KORC, drawing a lot of positive attention to the charity, including from the National Geographic Society, who filmed part of a documentary at the centre.

After being alerted by one of their voluntary workers, who was on holiday in Thailand, that 48 orang-utans were being kept illegally in a theme park in Bangkok, KORC got straight on the case to rectify this terrible situation. The poor creatures were being subjected to cruel conditions and trained to participate in kick-boxing shows. After a peaceful protest and the completition of many petitions, the Thai government invited K*O*R*C to present their case.

When K*O*R*C members presentations reminded them that it was against one of their own laws to keep endangered animals, the government had no choice but to intervene. K*O*R*C further persuaded them to donate money and help transport the orang-utans back to Borneo, to the rescue centre.

It was a tough job persuading the government to help - they were quite picky!

But the persuasive members of KORC manged to get the theme park shut down and the orang-utans taken to safety, ready for transportation to Borneo.

Once the orang-utans were safely at the rescue centre, we realised what a tough job it would be. There were not enough feeding platforms and many were too small, like this one. The team had to design and create new ones. Thorough health checks showed the poor condition of some of the orang-utans and tradgedy struck when one of the orang-utans died. An autopsy showed the terrible effects left from his kick-boxing days. The orang-utans needed a lot of medical care and love to help them become healthy and happy again.

Interview with an orang-utan
After the health checks showed how sick some of the orang-utans were, the volunteers at KORC got together to come up with a nutritious food supplement to make sure that the orang-utans got a balanced diet.

It seemed that a soon as one problem was
resolved, another one happened! Everyone
was shocked when a letter came from the bank
saying that the charity had no money left. The
quick thinking workers and volunteers came up
with a range of fund raising ideas, which soon
got the rescue centre back on its feet.

* The children had completed an enquiry, inspired by an assembly on the raft spiders at a local fen. They wrote reports as a 'degree' assignment, then attended their graduation ceremonies when they passed. As newly qualified scientists, they were nearly all happy to join KORC ... apart from one scientist. Professor Rusted decided he would rather go to the North Pole. His reasons? "It's colder there and I don't want to be too far away from my wife and family.' The other scientists were so disappointed to lose a team member, that they did everything in their power to get him to change his mind. Luckily, they were so persuasive that he did!

Le chocolatier

When the chocolatier employees set off for work one Monday morning they found, to their horror, that the chocolatier was on fire!

When the fire inspectors came, they sifted through the damage and found all kinds of hazards.

It turned out that an employee had left one of the chocolate melting machines on overnight. The manager thought she should be sacked, so the committee had to make a big descision.

Luckily, the committee found that there were overcircumstances that led up to this event, so they decided not to sack the employee. Everybody had to undergo fire safety training so that it wouldn't happen again.

The company decided to build new premises and had to decide on where was a good place for their new chocolatier. They were also invited to draw up plans for this new build and contribute to the designs for the shop front.

One day, a very strange French visito arrived, claiming to have a new delicious kind of chocolate. Quality control tasted it and got a 'marmite' reaction, some loved it, some hated it. We later found out it was 'mustard' flavoured and the recipe had been stolen from our sister company in Paris!

As soon as the new Chocolatier was up and running, company members set to work creating their new chocolates.

After the council intervened and requested that all products be Fair trade (as was customary in this new town) a lady called Malie came from Costa Rica to talk to us about cacao and also fair trade. Company members decide to create leaflets and booklets to inform their customers.

Le Chocolatier was a highly successful mantle that covered English, Geography, ICT, DT, art, some science and maths. Skills such as problem solving, collaborative working and developing independence were key.

Maths mantle: Chadbury's Chocolates

This post tells the story of

It is a regular favourite in the classroom and used for teaching many different maths units. It was so popular with the children, that I decided to make it into a bigger drama one year. So, we started with a GIANT problem! It all started with a message left on the company phone - a HUGE complaint from a disgruntled lady, who had apparently already sent letters and a fax!

Chadbury's Chocolates

Chadburys Chocolates faced some GIANT problems this week. They found out that their office system didn't work properly when they had failed to notice some letters and a fax from a disgruntled giant. It's the first time they have ever had to deal with dissatisfied customers!"Your cakes are too tiny!"Birthday cake? This is not a birthday cake. It's a mere bun!"

"I get a nice taste in my mouth, but it's gone in a flash!"

"Crispy cake! That's not a crispy cake, it's a crumb!"

The second crisis happened when somebody forgot to lock the office. The secret recipes were stolen from the safe! Fingerprints have been taken, and people have been acting suspiciously, but nobody knows where the recipes have gone. The biscuit design team have been hard at work, to create new recipes - for the GIANTS too!

Chadbury's packaging department then had to solve a big problem when they realised that their bags would not be big enough for the giant cookies.

Luckily, the clever guys in the packaging department solved the problem and came up with some great designs too!

Of course the next thing we had to do was to market our biscuits and gain some public opinion. The manager had sent a message saying that we couldn't afford to keep making giant biscuits if people didn't buy them!

Some company members decided to set up a taster session, others gave out leaflets and put up posters. After the public tasted our biscuits they said that they were fantastic and also said that any body would love them.

The manger told us that any body
who had a good design would get a pay rise!


They tested the size with a template, just the right size for the biscuits.

Chadburys chocolate employees then got to work to make some scrummy cookies. The advertising team created radio jingles to promote them.

The employees picked the jingle that they thought was the most catchy to go on air.




The company bakers got to work. Here's what they said:

We had a secret ingredient in our cookies.

We followed the recipe well and our cookies came out great.We had to make them for giants and they looked lovely and tasted lovely.

Our marketing department finally created questionnaires to make sure the public were getting the products they wanted from Chadburys chocolates. We like to keep our customers happy!

Thanks to everyone who filled in the questionnaires! It helped us to know what products we needed to create for the shops. We now have a good idea about what you enjoy eating!