Baking is a genuinely wonderful experience for children, offering not just four-and-twenty learning opportunities but hundreds of ways of enhancing children's learning and development. Its power lies in gathering the most important aspects of a child's life into one activity: being with others, being able to succeed, learning skills and having fun (Cohen, 2008). The entire process of baking, with its recipes, pictures, methods, books, stories, songs and history educates children and contributes to their healthy development. When you bake with children, so much more is being accomplished than simply letting them help in making the food and treats they love.
WHAT DOES BAKING BRING TO CHILDREN?
Valuable skills are being taught with every recipe. Children learn numeracy skills, such as addition and measurement, and they learn by touching, tasting, feeling, smelling and listening. They love to help prepare food and cook because this involves all their senses. They are learning that the letters on the paper have meaningful messages. Baking encourages teamwork and teaches children about 'the science of food'. All areas of learning can be covered, but most importantly, baking together creates fond memories and builds traditions that can really last a lifetime.
Personal, social and emotional development
Being together with others, feeling proud of what they can achieve and linking these to their own home life are great personal experiences for children. When the aroma of fresh bread or biscuits fills a room where we can sit together, eating our own 'products' as a family, the event triggers in a child the sense of belonging and well-being to which they are the most sensitive (Cohen, 2008).
Because of the time it takes for the ingredients to combine, a biscuit to rest or a loaf to rise, children develop precision and patience; it nurtures their scientific curiosity. What makes a loaf of bread rise? How can chocolate be liquid? Children will love the 'magic' of baking and the explanations behind it.
Through a baking activity, children learn to organise and follow through their plan. From shopping for ingredients to cleaning up and eating together, baking projects show young people the value of doing something properly and thoroughly.
Knowledge and understanding of the world
Before baking, you can visit a bakery or a farm shop. This instantly fills children with natural curiosity, since they want to know what everything does, how everyone works and how it all comes together. You can then set up a role-play area with a farm, a shop, a kitchen, bakery, a cafe or a picnic.
You can also plan different activities between the different stages of baking. These are great opportunities for children who would like a cooking party - there is plenty of time for pass-the-parcel, listening to stories and singing songs, and at the end the children can eat their own rolls with fresh fillings.
You can encourage the children to create magical, 'impossible' fillings for their rolls. You can even make butter by pouring double cream into a jar with two little marbles and by shaking it for a good 15 minutes.
Communication, language and literacy
The rolls we eat together can be 'secret message' rolls. They might belong to a story about a baker who likes to write messages to himself on bits of paper to remind him of daily must-dos and which have accidentally fallen into the dough and ended up in the customers' bread.
Children can share stories of baking, and their parents can visit the setting and get involved. Stories from all around the world can be shared and linked to various festivals. Having recipe cards and 'writing' and 'reading' a shopping list can improve reading comprehension and vocabulary. Following a recipe also provides good practice for instructional skills which prepare children for reading.
Problem-solving, reasoning and numeracy
Children can gain real-world numeracy knowledge through a baking activity: measuring teaches fractions; cutting bread or a cake into servings demonstrates ability in division; waiting for the alarm clock to ring when the baking is done helps children to understand the concept of time; working out how many cups of flour are needed for a recipe helps recognition of number. Creating evenly-spaced rows of biscuit dough on a baking tray helps children to use appropriate mathematical language like 'less', 'fewer' or 'more'. Working together and having to share equipment naturally helps the children's problem-solving skills.
Physical development
Kneading the dough is a very serious task and children will really make an effort to do it well. It develops greater strength in their muscles as well as pride in their souls! Once, when a child in my setting dropped a bread roll, one of his pre-school friends said very firmly, 'Look after it. I bakered it. With my own hand.'
Activities to develop the children's fine motor skills can be linked to the baking as well. They can cut around pictures in themed magazines to create their own recipe book, or make sculptures of salt dough, and their Gingerbread House could be the perfect decoration for the nursery.
Creative development
An art area filled with songs activates the hands of little bakers and puts 'magic' into their cakes and bakes. Makaton signs can enhance songs. Rhythm strengthens the hands and dissolves the line between play and work, so making something becomes an effortless learning process (Cohen, 2008).
Listening to music while baking gives children energy and pride and stimulates their imagination. It is the perfect time in which to introduce different types of music. Various traditional songs involve baking, such as, 'Oats and beans and barley grow', 'Sing a song of sixpence', 'Hot cross buns' and 'Pat a cake'. We can play games such us 'Five currant buns'. We can role-play stories such as the Gingerbread Man and Little Red Hen, or lesser known traditional stories, like the Scottish fairytale 'Rushen Coatie'.
HOW DO YOU GET STARTED?
The success of a baking activity starts with an appropriate plan, the right equipment and the right expectations. We need to set children tasks that are within their level of competence and suited to their abilities, and to praise them generously when they complete them. This makes each baking experience a positive one, even if the results do not resemble the pictures in the cookery magazines!
BASIC EQUIPMENT
All you need is: a set of little plastic bowls for ingredients, one or two measuring cups, measuring spoons, some spatulas, several wooden spoons, some tablespoons, three to five mixing bowls, a baking tray, aprons, a good plan, the ingredients - and willing children!
Ability to manage risk
It is natural to worry about safety when it comes to baking. However, as children are natural risk assessors, with a little instruction they will learn to respect safety guidelines without feeling anxious or fearful. Forbidding all equipment and methods that we consider dangerous will only create naive young people who are incapable of assessing their options independently when needed.
Handling sharp equipment tops parents' list of concerns when cooking with children. It can be addressed by proving that you have carried out risk assessments and have put reasonable measures in place to control risk. You should also invite parents to visit the setting during baking activities. You only need to show children what you are doing and explain the reasons for your actions to limit potential dangers (see 'The ABCs of Baking with Kids').
Important precautions
Basic hygiene is one of the most important precautionary measures that the children can learn to follow. Washing their hands with plenty of soap and water before starting and after finishing a baking activity is a key element of learning. Important, too, is that the children check their hands are dried thoroughly before handling utensils, so that they can maintain a good grip on equipment and avoid it slipping through their fingers. It is a good idea to create a list of safety steps with pictures or Makaton symbols for this purpose.
Make clear to the children that knives are sharp and are not toys. Always be on hand to supervise them when they are using knives and always ensure that the equipment is appropriate for the user. A serrated plastic knife works just as well as a metal knife with most baking ingredients and is safer for children to handle.
IS BAKING GOOD FOR ALL AGES AND STAGES?
Two-year-olds
Two-year-olds are learning to use the large muscles in their arms as well as developing their ability to concentrate and extend their vocabulary. They make connections and friendships during the baking session (see Cooking with Children: Kids in the kitchen).
They will enjoy activities such as:
- - washing and scrubbing vegetables and fruit
- - kneading and mixing
- - wiping tables
- - tearing lettuce and salad greens
- - breaking bread for stuffing
- - snapping fresh beans
- - pouring.
Three-year-olds
Three-year-olds are learning to use their hands and developing hand-eye co-ordination. They are learning to follow simple instructions.
Appropriate activities at this stage include:
- - pouring a certain quantity of liquids into a batter
- - mixing batter using their hands or their spoons
- - shaking a milkshake and whisking eggs
- - cracking eggs
- - spreading butter on a firm baking tray
- - kneading bread dough and rolling dough
- - cutting out biscuits
Four- and five-year-olds
Four and five-year-olds are learning to control smaller muscles in their fingers. They are learning about numerical problems, such as sorting dry and wet ingredients and dividing themselves into groups to carry out a project.
A suitable variety of activities to offer to them would include:
- - cutting bananas into cereal for a snack
- - juicing oranges, lemons, and limes
- - mashing soft fruits and vegetables
- - measuring dry and liquid ingredients
- - grinding cooked meat for a meat spread
- - beating eggs with an eggbeater.
WHAT ARE YOU BAKING IN YOUR PIE?
What you bake is entirely up to you and I think it is almost irrelevant. The focus should be on how you bake. Lee Cohen, in his inspiring book, Baking Bread with Children, says the most important ingredient is imagination. After years of baking with children, I could not agree more. You simply have to believe that it is you that can add the magic ingredient: your passion, your beliefs, your knowledge and your love.
And that magic ingredient is not really so mysterious. The sparkle begins with a couple of people spending time together making a plan and ends with the same people enjoying the results of this planning in the dining room. What has been baked in the pie does not even matter.
Judit Horvath is a nursery teacher and Early Years Professional in Essex and has an MA in Early Years Professional Practice
HEALTHY EATING
Getting involved in baking helps children to be conscious about their own eating habits (The ABCs of Baking with Kids). Seeing the food being prepared will make it easier for the children to experiment with new flavours, and the process heightens their interest in what they are eating.
Baking with children is probably the most effective way of improving their diet. A home-made bread roll with a home-made salad is energy-rich and nutritious and is devoid of the many additives and chemicals that are present in shop-bought products. We can introduce unusual food, fruit, seeds, grains, herbs and spices and our approach can be the role model for the children's attitudes and table manners.
REFERENCES
- - The ABCs of Baking with Kids is at: www.chsugar.com/familyfun/baking.html
- - Cohen, WL (2008) Baking Bread with Children. Hawthorn Press.
- - Van Horn, JE and Horning, L, Cooking with children: Kids in the kitchen. National Network for Child Care's Better Kid Care Project. University Park, PA: Penn State University.
