Cooking is a skill we hope all children we teach and care for can develop as they get older and build their independence. It is a life skill we often don’t give much thought to, however learning to cook is as valuable as using cooking to learn.
More and more Australian early childhood eealryducation settings and schools are growing their own food, cooking it together or both. Over 1000 early childhood services and schools in Australia deliver the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden program every year. Other such programs and community initiatives are building momentum across the country as teachers and families see the growing benefit in developing confidence in the kitchen.
Whilst sometimes daunting, exploring learning outside of a ‘chalk and talk’ setting can reinvigorate enthusiasm for learning. Regular cooking opportunities in the classroom (or even better, in a kitchen setting, if there is one available) can be that stimulating change of environment a neurodiverse student may be craving, that will then get them through the day. It could be the opportunity for a troublesome combination of friends to be independent of one another for an hour.
Reading, understanding and interpreting a recipe requires many skills explicitly taught in school. Whilst reading written instructions and following the sequence of a text seems like something we do regularly in adult life, transferring our understanding of a text to a physical task can be a rewarding achievement for young developing readers. Understanding the relationship between liquids, solids, different chemical compositions, the effects of heating and cooling and all that comes in between, teaches physical sciences and chemistry in a way that cannot be retained from reading a book or watching a video.
A recipe will often use multiple measures of volume and quantity, giving students a real reason to understand how many millilitres go into a litre, with real consequences to their work if they do not measure carefully. We also depend on cooking to build strong, healthy relationships with food by modelling balanced meals, looking at the nutritional value of what we make and how we consume it, in practice and not just theory.
The learning that comes from cooking is endless: safety and risk assessment, leadership, problem solving, cooperation. The list is endless. At home, cooking together has been proven to strengthen family wellbeing and mindfulness.
Whilst the benefits are pretty obvious, how do we connect it to planned learning in the classroom or homeschool curriculum? Twinkl has an amazing new ebook full of recipes and resources and here are some suggested curriculum links to your favourite recipes to get you started.
The great Twinkl Australia Cookbook
References
1. Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation. (n.d.). Impact and Reach. https://www.kitchengardenfoundation.org.au/impact/reach/
2. ScienceDirect. (2024). The role of cooking in education. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1499404624004196
3. Wellbeing. (n.d.). Developing Mindfulness in Kids Through Cooking. https://www.wellbeing.com.au/kinship/parenting/develop-mindfulness-kids-cooking.html
