F1 - Cooking - A Wealth of Learning and Development

Cooking in the early years is a great, fun experience which offers a wealth of learning and development. One cooking activity is able to promote all seven areas of the Early Years Foundation Stage and because children enjoy the experience so much they are not even aware they are learning about numbers or developing skills. As well as cooking developing all seven areas, it is a sensory experience often engaging all five senses, making it a more memorable experience and truly engaging the children during the early years. Cooking gives children knowledge about food, where it comes from and what is healthy and what is unhealthy. It is also gives them valuable self-help skills and they learn some delicious recipes along the way which they can share with you at home.
On Friday, the smell of chocolate cakes drifted through nursery and they smelt delicious! The children flocked to help Mrs P weigh out ingredients, mix them together, oh, and lick the bowl out!

We have also made banana cake, biscuits and cornflake buns. Friday is baking day if you want to pop in!

Tree-mendousTuesday was a different experience for morning and afternoon children this week as we are involved in a new Forest Schools experience, with Alice and Jayne from The Children’s Centre, with the afternoon children; the morning children will receive the same experience next week. It was all based around The Gruffalo story. We played a bingo game where we had to collect different natural items from the woods and stick them on our recording sheet. Then we made Gruffalo heads with clay and stuck them on the trees. The morning children visited the allotments and met lots of chickens and a few horses. Alaina’s granddad even gave us a few eggs, that the chickens had laid, and Miss Frisby will be making egg sandwiches tomorrow.

What another fabulous week full of exciting experiences. Look at our blog to see the daily learning and fun that occurs in nursery.