A fantastic way to improve this is allowing your children to watch and help you in the kitchen!
Taking the time to cook with your children can not only teach them skills that they will take with them for a lifetime but can have a variety of other benefits as well. What may seem like a sometimes boring chore for adults can be an exciting source of entertainment for kids.
The kitchen is the perfect place to teach kids about making healthy choices when eating. New foods and ingredients can be introduced to kids while cooking. Allowing them to taste, touch and smell new foods can not only broaden their knowledge base but can also help them develop their own individual palates as well. When children are exposed to healthy foods such as vegetables and fruits at an early age, they are more likely to choose these foods throughout life. Children are naturally inquisitive, so choosing ingredients and recipes creates a good opportunity to explain to them why certain foods are healthy and others are unhealthy. Making healthy eating fun will not only make mealtime a breeze but also can set your kids up for an overall healthy lifestyle.
The kitchen is an excellent environment for children to develop a variety of skills. Allowing children to use butter knifes and other blunt objects to help chop, mash and prepare food items can help develop their motor skills.. The kitchen is also an excellent place to practice math skills. Cooking provides an excellent opportunity to teach children about measurements, proportions and fractions.
Allowing your children to help out in the kitchen helps them establish a sense of responsibility. Children love to feel involved and are usually more than willing to help in meal and snack preparation. Allowing them to help at a young age will teach them responsibility that will carry into later years. As they age, they will be able to fix their own snacks and meals and even pack their own lunches. Being in the kitchen also teaches kids to make their own choices. When children help with meal preparation, they can take ownership of dishes they have helped prepare, and they are more likely to try new foods at meals.
Cooking is an excellent outlet for creativity, not only for adults but for children as well. Cooking allows for experimentation with combinations of flavors, colours and textures. From decorating cakes to creating their own recipes, the creative possibilities are endless. It is important to be supportive of children's creativity and to express to them that it is okay if things don't turn out perfectly. Some simple ideas for encouraging creativity are using cookie cutters to form sandwiches into fun shapes and allowing kids to make their own mini pizzas.
Cooking with your children allows for a bonding experience that can match no other. Preparing food together in the kitchen lets children and adults learn from each other and spend priceless time together. The one-on-one time spent in the kitchen can help build a parent-child relationship and memories that will last a lifetime.
Kiddy Cook classes are for children aged 2 – 11 years and are aimed at getting children interested in the food they eat whilst giving them the opportunity to meet new friends and have lots of FUN. Children get involved in the whole cooking process from reading the recipes to weighing and measuring the ingredients. Teaching our kids to appreciate where food comes from and how it comes to be will play an important role in raising a generation able to live a sustainable life and help shape the way they think about food.
Please see http://www.kiddycook.co.uk/ for more details