Kids and Cooking - Activities for Different Age Groups

I received several comments sharing their thoughts on the wonderful secret of cooking and teaching kids. One of the comments asked if there could be a list of cooking activity to match the different age groups.

Thank you for the comment. It is perhaps useful to summarize.

We must recognize that each child develops differently and may have different likes and dislikes. I hope you will be able to use this as a guideline to help with cooking with your kids.

I am also hoping to put together recipes appropriate for each age group.


It would be wonderful if you can share your recipes for mums and dads all over the world to equally share them with their kids.


Children Ages 3-6 years:
1. Stirring and Mixing
2. Rolling
3. Washing - vegetables and fruits.
4. Shred lettuce for a salad - tearing large and small pieces
5. Add ingredients to the recipe

Teaching opportunities – motor skills, cleanliness, order and organization, instructions, reading, sizes


Children Ages 6-8 years:
1. Set the table - this is a great way to show organization
2. Use child safe knife to cut soft foods
3. Beating ingredients
4. Fill and measure
5. Prepare simple meals

Teaching opportunities – motor skills, accuracy, math, instructions, sizes, handling knifes, sense of accomplishment


Children Ages 8- 10 years:
1. Prepare recipes
2. Use kitchen appliances
3. Measuring and estimating ingredients

The cooking opportunities grows as the child grows


Children Ages 10-12 years:
1. Prepare more complicated recipes independently
2. Use kitchen appliances such as an oven, microwave, knifes etc
3. Figure out recipes, maybe even create own ones


Children Ages 13-16 years:
1. Prepare recipes with multiple ingredients - helps child organize kitchen skills
2. Prepare recipes independently with little supervision - mastering these skills builds self-esteem and builds trust

Cooking with kids has immense rewards! I believe the best memories center around food. Food is the secret weapon to happiness and calmness and togetherness. And the potential satisfaction to our children and for us to be able to be with them.


Happy Cooking and Teaching!

What Kids and Cooking and Teaching Means? And How to Do it?

I  found this wonderful video on UTube. It shows how 2 very young children (5 years and a toddler) prepare a wonderful smootie! See how they do it. An execellant example of kids and cooking and teaching while cooking.

Watch the kids confidence and the fun they are having. There is a lot of encouragement and guidance. They need to mix and think and move - there is muscle movement. And they have their own preparation building pride for their work.

Kids and Cooking and How and What They Learn

Happy Cooking and Teaching!

Kitchen Safety for Kids

While cooking has a lot of positive teaching opportunities, we also cannot forget to teach basic kitchen safety. If we are particular about safety and continuously talk to them about it, it will stick and they carry it with them to pass it on to their young ones!


First lesson is for the adults – ask yourself 2 serious questions:

1. What do you think could be dangerous to a child in the kitchen

2. How do I make the kitchen safe while keeping the fun intact?

Now start kitchen safety by identifying and allocating age appropriate tasks

TWO-YEAR-OLDS

Two Year Olds are extremely exploratory – they have more power in their legs and hands. They touch anything and if they could, they would go anywhere. And they have short attention spans.

• Clean vegetables with brushes.
• Clean tables.
• Tear, break, and snap foods.

THREE-YEAR-OLDS

Three year olds a little more adventurous and more importantly they are growing and it is very important that they are given activities to stimulate and develop their motor skills and muscles at the same their brain is growing

This is make we can make them do in the kitchen

• Wrap foil around food.
• Wrap dough around meat or vegetable fillings
• Press dough into baking pan.
• Pour from small plastic pitchers. (Practice at the sink)
• Mix ingredients with hands or a wooden spoon (make sure that the container is twice the size of the amount of the mixture)
• Shake small jars of food.
• Spread foods using dull table knives or small spatulas.

FOUR-YEAR-OLDS

Your four year old could cook if they allowed to! At this age, they have firm grasp of the use of their fingers and they have developed good motor coordination.

These activities in the kitchen will help them develop:

• Use fingers to peel eggs, oranges, corn, etc.
• Roll and flatten food.
• Mash foods.

FIVE-YEAR-OLDS

Five year olds are ready to learn the real stuff. Teach them to use their hands and fingers properly and at the same time you can start introducing more serious subjects such as numbers, measuring, handling kitchen items and such.

These are some kitchen activities:

• Read to them from the recipe and help them measure ingredients.
• Cut soft foods.
• Teach knife safety: “Always supervise this activity”
Use a chopping board, a knife that fits their hands, and a plastic serrated knife for soft foods. Show how to hold a knife and cut safely. Teach them to keep the knife edge away. Show them what could happen if the knife cut their fingers.
• Turn a grinder.
• Grate food.
• Beat cake mixture or an egg with an egg beater.

We could as adults just not allow our kids to do any of the things above. For example- why teach them knife safety when it is easier and perhaps better in our minds just to keep them away from it all.

However, this is shielding the kids/over protective and we are not providing them with life skills. And that is why I think the kitchen is such a great place for us to teach these things – under supervision and the children are usually so busy having fun and doing their thing that they forget they are being taught. It will become natural for them to ensure safety later.

The kitchen can be dangerous and it is important that children are supervised while in the kitchen and allowed to do tasks that are age suitable for their age. I hope the above provides some a reference or checklist of ideas.

What do you think about teaching kids safety in the kitchen? Do you think there are more kitchen activities that can help with child safety?

What Cooking Does For Me – Chapter 2

My boy wrote this piece in Chapters. Chapter 1 was about how he felt about cooking. For the second Chapter he wrote about ‘Cooking Technology’. See Chapter 1 on this blog.

Again I have reproduced Chapter 2 here – except for spelling and perhaps some grammar, this is my son’s original piece.

Cooking Technology

If you don’t know how to cook, watch the Asian Food Channel on TV. My favorite show is Restaurant Makeover. It’s very interesting because it turns a bad restaurant into a good restaurant. A Bad Chef to a Good Chef.

You need to learn a few things in school to be a chef. You need to learn math, science, and English. Math is to help you know how to measure like how much water you need to add to your cooking. English is to understand cooking and read recipes. Science is to know about what is happening in cooking.

We learn things from cooking like knowing the right ingredients and making food delicious. You can also make drinks.

The end

P.S. My son's musings got me thinking, about children having ambitions to become chefs. I found some books. I reading  the Chef's story - its about their passion and what got them into the kitchen. Interesting read. There are others, if you are interested. 

Our children are angles, with dreams, creatively and imagination. If adults did not forget these child thoughts, the world would probably be a better place.