The way to learn anything is by doing it. That concept applies to children and cooking. One of the main reason for childhood obesity is that they are eating a lot of takeout food and “quick-fixings food” in the home. These types of foods are loaded with sugar. If you start teaching your children to cook from when they are a tiny tot they will not become obese. The old saying “Don’t do what I do, do what I say.” feeds into the example we are setting for our children. We are feeding our children in unhealthy ways and then we are expecting them to grow up and cook healthy and be trim. Does that make any sense?
By the age of 10 children should be able to cook at least one meal from start to finish by themselves. After that, add one meal for each year of life until they go away to school or they are out on their own. Also, the time you spend in the kitchen with your children is high quality time that they will remember forever. You can teach them that cooking can be fun and a hobby.
In the meantime, while having fun there are many other advantages. One huge advantage is that you are getting help in the kitchen, which every parent needs. Another important advantage is your children are learning to cook for themselves so when they are older they can cook their own healthy meals and save a lot of expense from eating out a lot. Cooking with your child also will help increase their self confidence because you are teaching them to be self reliable. All of this will help to develop a close relationship with your child. So you see, just learning to cook is only one of the positive by products of teaching your children to cook.
There are even health benefits in teaching your children to make cookies. Homemade cookies are far superior than store bought cookies because you can control what type of fat is used. The amount and type of sugar can also be controlled. Store bought cookies can contain several types of fats and several types of sugars which only lead to childhood obesity. Children brought up in homes that have homemade sweets are rarely overweight.
Also, if you are looking for a summer camp for your children, check out some of the locale cooking schools to see if they have any children cooking classes. They usually try to make it a fun experience. If you know how to cook it affects all parts of your life in a positive sense, so give your children the gift that they will use their whole life.
We would love for you to share with us your tips for children cooking in the comment box below. Also, share the ideas in this blog with mothers of young children by clicking the “Share” tab. If you liked the ideas in this article click “Like”. Thank you for your participation.