Cooking together as a family is a great bonding experience for parents and children of all ages. That being said, the kitchen is somewhere you can spend time together doing plenty of different activities, which will help to build your child’s confidence in many different aspects of their lives. Keep reading as we share some of our favorite non-cooking activities kids can do in the kitchen.
Art Projects
The kitchen is the perfect place to unleash your child’s creativity and enjoy doing art projects together. In fact, you could even combine cooking and art by making fun fruit faces or other designs out of colorful pieces of food. The kitchen often has large surfaces where your children can enjoy painting or coloring, allowing them to be more creative and spend hours making beautiful paintings or designs. Even if you aren’t the most confident artist, you’ll find that this is an activity that is very personal and doesn’t require you to be good or bad to enjoy it. Just make sure you offer your children plenty of space and the tools they need in order to make a beautiful piece of artwork they’ll be proud to show off to everyone once they are finished with it.
Sensory Activities
There are endless different sensory activities you can enjoy in the kitchen. While playing with food is certainly one activity that will fall under this category, we also recommend buying some play dough for your children. This is a great way to teach them basic cooking skills without wasting food or risking germs spreading. They can learn to cut different shapes and build sculptures, giving them hours of entertainment and fun. Other good sensory activities you might want to consider include adding a sandbox in the corner of your kitchen or playing with sound tubes. Encouraging your children to learn more about their five senses and use them through different activities will help them in so many aspects of their lives in the future.
Washing and Cleaning
Another essential life skill that can be passed on by spending time in the kitchen is the importance of cleaning and tidying. Even when you aren’t cooking, young children can learn to wash produce and ensure the items are safe to eat. Cleaning and tidying is something that is quite a challenge to teach children, but the kitchen presents so many different challenges and chores for them to learn about. You can teach them to recycle in the different trash bins you have in the kitchen, sharing the importance of separating different items to protect our planet. They can also learn how to clean surfaces and wash plates and dishes, which are skills they’ll thank you for teaching them when they are older.
Setting the Dinner Table
When you are next cooking dinner for the whole family, enlist your children to help you with setting and clearing the dinner table. You can get them to do this once with your supervision, and from then on, they’ll be able to take over this task by themselves. Make sure your younger children are old enough to hold knives though, otherwise leave this task to the adults or older children. The great thing about this activity is that they can also become more creative with their table settings. Children might enjoy adding folded napkins or colorful additions to the table. You can even challenge them to make table settings themed to the time of year, such as Halloween or Christmas.
Putting Away Groceries
Teaching your children where everything belongs in the kitchen is a skill that will not only help them later in life but save you hours of time with your chores in the future. Children will learn about different food groups and how various items of food should be stored in the kitchen. You can teach them more about the fridge, freezer, or storage cupboards you have and why different foods need to be stored at a certain temperature to look after your health.
Science Experiments
One of the most fun ways to use your kitchen with your children is to make it into a science lab for the day. There are so many experiments that you could perform in the kitchen, including making slime, learning about the different states of matter, or mixing colors. You’ll find so many ideas online for basic science lessons for children. Instead of just teaching from a textbook that so often happens at school today, this hands-on approach will make them more engaged in their learning and ensure they remember everything that they have been taught to take back to the classroom with them. You don’t need any special equipment to get started either, as you can use a lot of the kitchen containers and tools you already have.
Gardening Activities
The final suggestion on our list today is to use your kitchen as an indoor garden space. One of the most basic gardening activities you can enjoy with your kids is growing cress in egg shells, which shows them just how easy it is to grow plants in your home. From there, you can expand their knowledge by teaching them about garden herbs and plants. This can be combined with your future cooking activities, where you can use the produce that you’ve grown in various recipes to help make fresh and healthy dishes from your home garden.
As you can see, there are endless non-cooking activities you can enjoy with your little ones in the kitchen. We encourage you to have a go at any of these activities the next time you are wondering how to entertain your children indoors for the day. No matter their age, you can customize these activities to the lessons you are hoping to teach them and their personal interests. Of course, we also recommend using the kitchen to teach your children about cooking and preparing food, which is a lifelong skill that they’ll use for many years to come.
