Teaching Ideas While You Bake

I have shared my chocolate muffins recipe and also my carrot cake recipe recently. And I have told you earlier that baking chocolate muffins was the activity I planned to carry out with my eight years old as he was getting bored the other day.

So why did I think of such activity? What did my son learn out from it?

Oh well, there were a number of things, a little bit of Math and a little bit of Science and a little bit of Reading involved in the different tasks we did to make the muffins. Not to forget the cognitive and instructions following skills that were on the run while the activity was being carried out!

Here is a list of ideas for you to teach your kid while they are helping you out with baking:

• Make them read the recipe twice or thrice until they get all the words. 

• Ask them if they would like to make any changes with the recipe, like if they want to add any chocolate chips to the batter in the end or if they would like to make the recipe with a different flavor altogether? and so on. This results in a boost in creativity powers of the young minds.

• Make them measure the ingredients accordingly as per the recipe.. this will teach them the mathematical concepts of how much?, different measuring units (tbsp/cups/ounces), half/quarter. This they will learn all while having fun at the same time!

• Give them full authority over the activity.. make them feel they are actually doing the whole thing and that our mom is just accompanying us in the kitchen. They will feel proud of themselves and will go on telling just everybody what great work they have done that day!

• Keep asking them about the next step they have to take after completing each step successfully. This will give them the ability to follow instructions in a logical and sequential manner.

• Show them how the cake rises in the oven and describe to them the concept of rising via baking powder or yeast (if you don’t know, you can look on Google yourself :))

• Ask them again in the evening the whole procedure what they would do if they had to make the same thing again! This will enhance their memory skills and also boost a confidence in them. Also make them narrate the baking tale to people around them afterwards, their grandma or their favorite aunt..

If you have any more ideas, do share them here 🙂