Cupcake workshop

Cooking is an activity that makes it possible to improve several skills at the same time.  Children can improve math, science, language, motor development, creativity, logical thinking and social skills through cooking at school.  Also, this type of task is quite fun and welcoming.

 Development of motor skills and body awareness

 Cooking provides children with ample opportunities to develop coordination.  Pouring ingredients from a measuring cup into a bowl and kneading dough are just a few examples of how having fun cooking at school promotes body awareness.

 In addition, preparing food helps to develop fine motor skills through activities such as breaking eggs, chopping, stirring, pouring, cutting, etc.

 Mixing ingredients and using cookie cutters, for example, are great ways to increase strength and control in fine motor activity, which is essential for other tasks like writing, cutting and coloring.

 Learning and reinforcement of basic concepts from different areas

 Cooking helps to expand the child's vocabulary

 Basic math (“how many eggs do we need?”) and sequencing (“what comes first … next … last?”) skills can help the student better understand, for example, how to work with fractions (“Is that ¾ of a cup?”).

 Cooking offers the opportunity to also learn about food groups and how vegetables grow, observe how they change during cooking, and other practices that facilitate science learning.

 It also contributes to expanding vocabulary, through new words in recipes, names of ingredients, cooking methods, etc.

 waste awareness

 With cooking activities it is possible to better understand the notion of waste and ways to avoid it.

 focus and attention

 When cooking, children need to stay focused and pay attention to every detail and step.

 Learning about healthy eating

 Cooking allows children to learn about nutrition education, how to plan meals, make healthier food choices and what to avoid (and why).

 Self confidence

 When a child successfully completes a recipe and makes a meal, he feels pride and confidence.

 Also, as children cook more, their level of independence increases, which in turn should boost their self-confidence and improve self-esteem.

 Development of social skills

 Children can practice a surprising amount of social skills through cooking.

 Collaborating on recipes, preparing and serving meals, sharing utensils, helping a colleague, negotiating what will be prepared – all of these involve learning and practicing essential skills for a full social life.

 Problem solving

 In a way, recipes are like puzzles.  Each ingredient and process fits into a sequence.

 Preparing food requires children to think about this sequence, assess how progress is going, and notice if anything is off the charts.

 If something goes wrong, she will need to look for a solution to the problem (“would adding more milk help improve the recipe that has a lot of flour?”), for example.  And this provides the development of problem-solving skills.