Cooking and baking are two truly great kids activities – some of the best out there, really! I love that all four of my kids enjoy cooking and baking with me. Spending time with my kids in the kitchen is a great opportunity to bond with my kids, and they learn a lot about math, science, and healthy eating in the process!
Benefits of Cooking and Baking for Kids
Cooking and baking teaches kids so many great things! Here are a few benefits of cooking and baking for kids:
- STEM Cooking and baking are two of the most extensive Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math activities out there! Kids learn about science as they see ingredients transformed into a dessert of dinner dish. They use technology to heat, bake, and even chop food. And creating a dish (or dessert) from raw ingredients is engineering – or tinkering, as we often describe engineering for kids. Next time you bake or cook together, set aside some of the food and try adding a secret ingredient that your child suggests. How does it change the dish? Last but not least, baking and cooking involves a lot of measuring and counting – important math skills!
- Health consciousness It’s hard to explain to a child why we want them to eat one thing and not another when they don’t understand the process that goes into creating the food they eat. Cooking and baking breaks food into basic ingredients, and having the final product broken down like this makes kids much more aware of what they are putting into their mouths, and why.
- Gross motor skills Cooking and baking usually requires some stirring, chopping, and grating and this helps kids develop gross motor skills. My kids also enjoy carrying ingredients for dishes that they have planned into the house after going grocery shopping – another great gross motor activity for children.
- Fine motor skills Measuring small quantities of ingredients, such as spices, is a great way for kids to practice their fine motor skills! Let them measure the ingredient over a plate when they are first starting out so that they don’t have to stress too much about spilling.
- Responsibility My kids love planning out a meal, and I have noticed that the surest way to get my kids to try new foods is to have them cook those foods themselves!
- Self-confidence Kids realize that cooking and baking are both complex activities that take a lot of planning, organizing, and careful work to complete successfully. Going through these steps successfully builds self-confidence.
- Learning it’s okay to make mistakes Sometimes things go wrong in the kitchen. We mix the wrong ingredients, or a recipe just does not turn out the way we expected. Cooking and baking are wonderful ways to practice working through mistakes.
- Parent-child bonding I saved this for last, because it’s my favorite – and, really, the most important piece of this list! My kids thrive on working as my peer in the kitchen. I love the space this creates for them to tell me what is on their mind, and to learn and grow together.
The photos in this post are from a fun baking session Lily and I enjoyed yesterday – we made my favorite pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. The photo above captures the fun we had together! The cookies were delicious, and when we picked Emma and Johnny up from school later that afternoon it was so fun to hear her proudly tell them that there were cookies waiting at home – cookies she baked!
Do you have a favorite dish that you enjoy making with your kids?
MaryAnne is a craft loving educator, musician, photographer, and writer who lives in Silicon Valley with her husband Mike and their four children.
My girls love to cook and bake!
We love cooking and baking together and this post highlights exactly why it’s such a valuable experience. Thank you.
It’s such a nice time to build memories with a child!
I love cooking and baking with my kids! Joshua has been really interested in learning to cook which has been fantastic!
Hooray for kids who love to cook!
Too true! We need to do more cooking together. Baking is easier, because all the mixing takes place away from the oven. Cooking, with burners going, and kids spinning through the kitchen – is always more difficult for me.
Cooking is definitely more tricky. I find it much easier to have multiple kids helping with a baking project – I tend to stick to only one helper at a time when it comes to cooking dinner.
The kiddos and I cook together often. I agree, agree, agree with your points in this post! So many benefits to family cooking time!
This post totally speaks to me. I’m passionate about cooking and helping my boys understand what’s in their food and I love, love, love hands-on learning with them. Thanks for outlining so many benefits to cooking with kids, MaryAnne! I’ve shared this on my blog’s FB page so my followers don’t miss it!
I love to cook with my kids. We don’t do it quite as often as I want to.
Great pictures! I love how proud Lily was. :) My kids enjoy helping in the kitchen and carrying groceries, too, and you’re reminded me that this is definitely something I want to continue to nurture.
Sooo many benefits of cooking and baking with your kids. For my eldest, the biggest benefit to him is spending time with me. He also loves the science aspect of it, and can see how things change and why. And it’s a great way to get them to eat food that they might be a bit hesitant to eat, knowing just what went into it, and the pride at having made it!
Great post. We make a point to cook or bake together every week, and my 7 year old is really looking forward to it, especially to baking :)
What a good reminder about baking and cooking with kids! I like the end result … and I forgot about all the learning that also goes on. It’s also such a useful life skill and the younger they start, the more they seem to love it and really do it on their own.
This is a great list of the benefits of getting kids interested in cooking and baking. In the longer term, I think that cooking and baking are life skills that are really important when it comes to being independent.