Cooking teaches more than food making skills.
Teaching a child to cook will equip him with a valuable life skill. Cooking with children is also fun, as long as the adult has some patience, some time and can cope with a mess for a while. Cooking with kids can be emotionally satisfying -- as well as educational. From math to reading, geography to science, it's hard to think of another everyday chore that gives as many educational opportunities as cooking.
Literacy
Following a recipe requires reading skills. Successfully cooking a recipe requires reading for knowledge. Each cook book is a reference work. Show your child look for a recipe using an index. Use this as an occasion to explain or refresh the rules for putting words in the alphabetical order. It will also reinforce the importance of knowing correct spellings. Practice reading aloud using recipes. During preparation, ask your child to figure out which ingredients and utensils the recipe requires. This teaches attention to detail and double-checking, important research skills. Encouraging your child to explain the recipes in her own words will ensure that she understands what she has read. Make sure to explain difficult words or abbreviations.
Math Skills
Measuring the ingredients requires math skills: counting, fractions, division and multiplication. Young children also practice sorting, color and shape recognition as they handle ingredients and utensils. Cooking involves counting and measuring ingredients. In addition to counting out spoonfuls and weighing, it's an occasion to show the equivalence of units: if no tablespoons are available, use three teaspoons. Reworking a recipe also requires basic math skills. If the recipe specifies ingredients for eight people, ask your child to rework it for four, which will require division. A cake recipe requires four eggs; ask him to recalculate the amounts of flour and butter needed if you want to make a bigger cake with six eggs.
Health and Nutrition
School curricula highlight healthy eating, and cooking is an opportunity to reinforce this message. Handling and selecting ingredients helps kids learn about food groups, making up a balanced meal and choosing healthier options. Ask them to read the nutrition information and compare different products so they learn to interpret nutrition claims and specific figures.
Motor Skills
Mixing, chopping and decoration all practice fine motor skills. Even young kids can stir, fold, mash and mix under adult supervision. Chopping and cutting is a job for older hands, but safer tools will work fine on softer ingredients. For instance, a carrot is too hard to chop safely with a table knife, but this kind of knife will cut a bell pepper. Cake decoration, garnishing a salad or just stacking sandwiches or cupcakes on a platter all require a steady hand and a good eye.
Geography and Culture
Cooking ethnic food vividly illustrates the diversity of cultures, while any cooking project gives occasion to talk about the origins of the food. If cooking Chinese, eat the meal with chopsticks, and if you feel adventurous, prepare an Indian or Ethiopian feast to be eaten with hands only. Many children are confused about where the things they eat come from. Check the labels for the country of origin to find out whether the product grows in your region and or has been imported from another country.The origins of meat may naturally lead to a discussion of ethical dilemmas and vegetarian choices. It is not only a valid subject worth talking about but also an occasion to talk about other food-related cultural rules, from eating kosher or halal to veganism or choosing organic.
Science
The process of cooking resembles a scientific project. Observation, prediction and experiments are commonplace in the kitchen. The chemistry and physic of cooking and baking is fascinating even for experienced cooks. Children can observe freezing and evaporation, cooling and heating. The changes that mixing and heating induce are examples of physical processes and chemical reactions. Biology lessons naturally arise during food preparation. Younger children in particular like to identify where their favorite vegetables come from. Make a meal that includes vegetables from each part of a plant: roots (for example, carrots), stalks (celery), leaves (lettuce), seeds (peas) and flowers (broccoli).
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